There was just under three minutes left in Game 4 of the Boston Celtics playoff game against the New York Knicks when it happened. The Celtics lost the ball, and their star player, Jayson Tatum, seemed to dive to recover it, but as Knicks forward OG Anunoby scooped it up and took it the other way for a dunk, Tatum never got up. As he rolled around in pain, clutching his leg, it soon became obvious that Tatum had suffered a serious injury. Tatum exited the game, and the MRI he took the next day confirmed everyone’s fears; Tatum suffered a torn Achilles tendon.
In “The Quiet Work,” a mini-documentary series that chronicles rehab from the injury, Tatum expressed the fears he felt after suffering the injury. He recalled thinking, “Am I ever going to play again?”
The widely accepted belief was that Tatum’s injury would require him to miss the entire 2025-26 season. However, it now seems more than likely that he will return to the Celtics to finish out the last part of the regular season on the squad and slowly get prepared for a playoff run that Boston hopes will find the team back in the NBA Finals like they were two seasons ago when they won the NBA championship.
So how did he do it? What can other players with serious injuries learn from Tatum’s challenges?
Action
It shouldn’t need to be said, but intention is only as good as the action that follows it. Most people who suffer a serious injury want to recover and get back to their sport, but they have to ask themselves if they are honestly willing to do the long, tedious, and boring work that is required. As an example, Tatum said, “I’ve been in the weight room for nineteen weeks.” He just stuck with it every day, doing the grind that made recovery a possibility. Not everybody can do that. Where does that motivation to keep at it come from?
Belief
The first thing is belief. If you don’t believe you can recover, there’s a much larger chance that you won’t. However, this belief can sometimes be hard to come by; in those moments, it is ok to lean on others for support. For Tatum, that support came from his mom. In “The Quiet Work,” Tatum credited his mother for giving him the belief that he would fully recover. He said, “My mom was like, ‘If anybody can come back from this, it’s you.’”
Purpose
Tatum also cited his commitment to others. “There are people counting on me to fight through this.” You will often hear players talking about playing for each other when they are interviewed after a championship. Dr. Glenn Fox, a USC neuroscientist who teaches a GameChange Training Camp called “High Performance Mindset,” explained the importance of purpose in the class. “Purpose relates to the story we tell about why we’re doing what we’re doing. What is it that’s bigger than we are?” He added, “Research has shown again and again that having an identity based on purpose tends to be a much better predictor of how far you’re going to go in life.”
