Like many players of his generation, Jayson Tatum grew up a massive Kobe Bryant fan.
After his one standout season at Duke, Tatum entered the 2017 NBA Draft, where Kobe’s team — the Los Angeles Lakers — had the No. 2 pick. Tatum said on the Club 520 Podcast this week that he had hoped to follow Kobe’s footsteps in Los Angeles but the Lakers never even saw him come and work out.
Philadelphia had the No. 1 pick in the draft and Markelle Fultz was considered a pretty clear No. 1 selection that season (what happened to his shot between college and the NBA is another entire podcast).
The Lakers — then in the Magic Johnson/Rob Pelinka era (Pelinka had just been hired in March) — had their sites focused on UCLA’s Lonzo Ball at No. 2. How high was Magic on Ball? At the draft pick’s introductory press conference, Magic pointed up at the retired jerseys that hung above them (Jerry West, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Wilt Chamberlain, Magic himself, and the list goes on and on) and said he expected Lonzo Ball to have his jersey hung up there with them. Joining Hall of Famers is an impossibly high bar to ask of any rookie.
Tatum says after a public pre-draft workout, someone with the Celtics approached him and told him they loved his game and wanted to draft him (the smart money is on that being Danny Ainge). Boston did that with the No. 3 pick. Four All-NBA seasons, five All-Star games and one NBA championship later, that draft worked out well for the Celtics.
Drafting Ball worked out for the Lakers, if not as originally envisioned. Despite injuries (which have been the story of his NBA career), Ball was good enough to be a key part of what the Lakers sent to the Pelicans in the Anthony Davis trade, a deal that brought a championship to Los Angeles.
Still, it’s hard not to daydream a little about how Tatum might have changed the trajectory of the Lakers franchise.