Double Dribble Previews: Atlantic Division

**Mo Dakhil** (0:04)
Welcome to the Double Dribble Podcast with Dubin and Doc Kiel. That's Jared Dubin, author of Last Night in Basketball. I'm Mo DeKiel, former NBA video coordinator. And folks, we're back.

**Jared Dubin** (0:16)
We're back.

**Mo Dakhil** (0:17)
Well, we've been around. We've done a roundtable on the RealGM Network with Wes and Mike and all that stuff. But we're back now to our original stuff because the season's not too far from now. Jared, how are you doing? I've missed you, my man.

**Jared Dubin** (0:32)
I'm doing great, man. I missed you too. This is going to be great. I'm excited. We're going to preview the season division by division, just like we did last year, starting with the Atlantic Division, home of the defending champion, New York Knicks. I got the Knick hat on once again.
I'm ready.

**Mo Dakhil** (0:48)
And I know we're back because it only took us 20 minutes of troubleshooting before we actually got the podcast recorded. Everything's fine on my end, Jared, just so you know. So that's our stuff. We're rolling out, but we have folks. That's how we know we're back. We always have problems. We got to work it out and together now. Jared, at the end of this, we're going to talk college football. It's that time of the year.
We'll get into all of that fun stuff. But you teased it. We're going right into the Atlantic Division. We got to talk about the champs. And last year you did a great job kind of laying out questions.
And then we just kind of followed that template. And it was perfect. And we're going to do it again. Because, of course, I don't do the homework.
I'm just not good about doing the homework.

**Jared Dubin** (1:34)
Yeah, that's kind of my role here. We're going to do it the same way we did last year. We're going to go through each division, and we're going to take the teams in alphabetical order. So even though the Knicks are the defending champions, we're not going to start with them. We're going to start with the Boston Celtics.
Over under 51 and a half wins this year. They drafted Chris Sinak, re-signed Ron Harper, signed Mike Conley, signed Mitchell Robinson. Three years, 47 million. Traded Jalen Brown for Paul George and two first round picks. Extended Demi Esqueda, four years, 56 million. Extended Jordan Walsh, I believe, three years, 15 million.
Like I said, over under 51 and a half wins. I did forget to say what we're going to do for the questions. So the questions are, we are going to do one thing we're excited about for each team, one thing we're worried about for each team, and then one prediction for each team. It could be a prediction of literally anything that's going to happen for them in the season. It could be an over under, it could be the result of the season, it could be they're going to trade somebody, whatever it is, we're just going to make one prediction. But Mo, what are you excited about for the Boston Celtics in the 2026-27 season?

**Mo Dakhil** (2:39)
I'm excited to see Jason Tatum really in full force. You know, look at, we know he got him at towards the end of the season last year, and you know, very mysteriously doesn't play game seven. They never tell anybody. I still don't know what the injury, I don't even know if he just missed the bus and they never went back and got him, or if there was an actual injury, like there's like, there's not been nothing, no discussion about it at all whatsoever.

**Jared Dubin** (3:06)
Didn't they claim it was like knee soreness or something? I can't, they claimed it was something that was not a calf injury, even though everybody saw that it was a calf injury.

**Mo Dakhil** (3:14)
Yeah, and I think it was weird and dubious with what they did, which, you know, is a little bit worrisome, but I think him getting that 20 or so games in the regular season, a couple of playoff games under his belt, and hopefully there was no serious setback or anything that they're hiding from us. It's going to be fun to watch Tata back on the floor. Like, this is going to be great, like, in that regard. I think he's going to come back. I think it's still going to take time to figure out his whole flow and his rotate, you know, get back in the groove of things. It's also a different environment than what he had before. Look, whatever you want to say about Jalen Brown, it was always nice to have that release valve if you were Tata. We're like, oh crap, I'm stuck. I don't have anything. Let me give it to Jalen, see if he can make something happen.