DHL Dan CLXX - Put Up Or Shut Up

Alternate title - Shank's off the bandwagon:

It’s put up or shut up time for Celtics stars Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown, and other thoughts

MIAMI — Picked-up pieces while noting the loss of Jim Brown, the greatest football player who ever lived …

▪ The shocked and chagrinned Celtics have taken their significant talents to South Beach after metaphorical victory cigars exploded in their faces in two games at the Garden.

The eighth-seeded Miami Heat outhustled and outplayed your not-as-good-as-they-think-they-are Celtics and now the Eastern Conference finals move to Miami for Game 3 Sunday night at Kaseya Center.

It’s put up or shut up for Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown, who were named two of the league’s top 10 players in 2022-23. Tatum and Brown carry themselves as if they have won multiple championships. By Boston Celtic standards, they have won nothing. And this is supposed to be their time.

The two Jays were no-show, turnover machines in crunch time of the stunning losses (the C’s are 4-5 at home in these playoffs). Boston blew a 13-point lead in Game 1, and led by 12 in the first minute of the fourth on Friday. Tatum did not record a basket in the fourth quarter of either loss. Brown on Friday was ineffective at both ends, scoring a mere 16 points and getting torched by the undrafted likes of Caleb Martin and Duncan Robinson.