LeBron James Calls Out Jayson Tatum, Jaylen Brown After Celtics’ Elimination

Were the Celtics victims of their own success in the 2025 NBA playoffs?

One of the best basketball players of all time believes so.

Boston’s run at a second straight championship came to a screeching halt in the Eastern Conference semifinals, where New York knocked off the reigning champions in six games. Many will point to Jayson Tatum’s Achilles injury as the main reason why the Celtics were upset by the Knicks, but let’s not forget how the series played out before the six-time All-Star went down. Boston blew a pair of 20-point leads in back-to-back games at TD Garden, and it executed very poorly in the second half of Game 4.

So, what went wrong? How did virtually the same team that lost only three playoff games en route to a title last season face such difficulty against a less talented conference foe? LeBron James offered a theory on the latest “Mind the Game” podcast, and he initially focused on the Celtics’ franchise cornerstones.

“It seems like sometimes, it seems like they get bored sometimes with the — I don’t want to say the process. Because I mean, (expletive), they are who they are, and when you look at Tatum and (Jaylen) Brown, this is years and years and years and years, they’ve punched their 10,000 hours,” James said, as transcribed by CBS Sports. “But sometimes it seems like they get a little bored because of how great they are. Not only as those two as individuals, but then as a team sometimes it looks like they get bored.”

While Tatum, Brown and their teammates might not have become “bored” this postseason, the Celtics did appear to rest on their laurels. They didn’t adjust when their 3-point-focused offense, which was nearly unstoppable for quite some time, wasn’t working. Boston also seemed somewhat overwhelmed by adversity — something it didn’t really face in the 2024 playoffs.

For so many reasons, the 2024-25 Celtics likely will be remembered for what could have been. And the dwelling could intensify if Boston makes seismic moves this offseason that yield a playoff drought.