Why Jayson Tatum disguised his girlfriend's pregnancy from the NBA and the Celtics On "In Depth with Graham Bensinger," ...

 Why Jayson Tatum disguised his girlfriend's pregnancy from the NBA and the Celtics

On "In Depth with Graham Bensinger,"  Jayson Tatum was asked to recall the events around the time he learned that his fiancée Toriah Lachell was expecting a child, just before he was expected to be one of the top players selected in the 2017 NBA Draft.

This was a week or so before the end of the school year, so in my head, I was going to leave Duke, get ready for the Draft, live my life, and have a blast. Then it's like, "No, you're about to have a child,"  Jayson Tatum remarked.

"To be honest, I was initially selfish. Because I had spent my entire life dreaming of playing in the NBA and the best day of my life was just two months away, I was more concerned about being picked than I was about becoming a father. I kept it a secret from everyone, including my teammates and coaches. Jayson Tatum was reluctant to inform the NBA and then the Celtics of his girlfriend's pregnancy.

Jayson Tatum on Instagram

Now that Deuce, also known as Jayson Tatum Jr., is five years old, Tatum refers to his son on Instagram as his "twin." Tatum, though, was worried prior to the baby's delivery.

When questioned about being "worried" about telling the company about the pregnancy, Tatum continued to discuss his tunnel vision.

He remarked, "I didn't want it to affect where I got drafted." "I was worried because I feared that if teams discovered I was expecting a child, they would think I wasn't focused and not pick me. I wanted to keep it a secret from everyone, which was really self-centered. I recall telling Brad Stevens about this. I recall that one of the trainers knew when we were in the air. Have you told Brad yet? he asked. … She shouldn't be due till the following week, right? You could be late to a game. I think, "Oh s-t."

Tatum claimed that Stevens was very encouraging and that having his son accelerated the maturation process.

The star of the Celtics also discussed the rough love he received from his father when he was little.

Then, at halftime, I would come out and outscore the rest of the team, and we would win. "I was afraid of him, and he would grab me by my shirt and pin me up against the wall, and yell me out in front of everyone. He reasoned that in order to move me toward a particular point, he needed to push my buttons. He was so cruel to me as a child that I got the impression that he didn't like me. Of course he did, but when I was a child, I couldn't tell coach from dad because there was only one of them. He would always take it to the extreme when he told me I was weak, I wasn't going to succeed, and I was going to be nothing. But part of my motivation for exercising at 5:30 in the morning was to disprove him.