ATLANTA — Standing among giants at 6-1, Payton Pritchard has been easy to miss.
Early in his college career at Oregon, Pritchard was occasionally mistaken for the team manager. Just two summers ago at the Las Vegas Summer League, he was stopped from sitting with Celtics staffers by arena security. And over the first three years of his NBA career, he was stuck on the bench, leading to multiple unfulfilled trade requests.
Pritchard has been impossible to miss these days. After the first two weeks of the 2024-25 season, he’s fifth in the league in bench scoring, averaging a career-high 16.0 points per game.
Pritchard has always been able to score — he once dropped 92 points in a pro-am game. It’s been the other stuff that was holding him back. Those small improvements in his game have earned him the role of first guard off the bench for the Celtics and turned him into the front-runner for Sixth Man of the Year.
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How Payton Pritchard became Sixth Man of the Year favorite
The Celtics barrage teams with 3s and Pritchard is leading the charge. His 12.1 attempts from deep per 36 minutes are tied with Jayson Tatum for the highest on the team and he’s connecting on a stellar 43.2 percent of those looks.
The flashiest of those 3s come at the end of quarters. Everyone knows how much of a threat he is in those situations, except perhaps the Bucks. They didn’t read the scouting report on him, putting Doc Rivers into shambles after Pritchard buried a trademark 3 against them early in the season.
Payton Pritchard had Doc Rivers in hell 😂😂 pic.twitter.com/1HlNGs1yss
— Gump Cathcart (@bubbagumpino) October 29, 2024
Rivers was upset about the team allowing that shot. He circled Pritchard’s name before the game, pointing out that he was a game-changer. It was more than his shooting that Rivers warned of though.
“He’s just tough. Little tough dude,” Rivers said after the game. “He’s that little pest that gets under everyone’s skin.”
“He’s just a well-rounded player,” Mazzulla told Sporting News a week later in Atlanta. “Every night, success looks different for him.”
The Celtics fell in love with Pritchard due to his drive to improve. He was a gym rat in high school, starting workouts every day at 6 AM where he would dribble a weighted ball in the family’s garage for 20 to 30 minutes.
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Pritchard’s routine wouldn’t change even in the winter.
“It’s a cold garage. From the ball being rough, it would split my fingers, almost like paper cuts. And then over time, they would become big gashes.”
Pritchard would tape his bloodied fingers, much to the chagrin of his high school coach who urged him not to burn out. Pritchard smiled while recounting the memory, looking over his palms.
“To make it in this league,” he told me, “you have to have an incredible handle.”
Those 6 AM drills were just the start of Pritchard’s day. He would follow up with a second workout after lunch. A third came after school, and he would finish off the day by attending his father’s coaching clinics.
Those long days gave Pritchard surprisingly strong hands, which he has used to become a good rebounding guard. He’s not afraid to box out anyone, even 7-footers like Giannis Antetokounmpo. He’s not as tall and can’t jump as high as the other players in the crowd, but “if the ball’s in the air and I get my hands on it, I can grab it.”
Pritchard is a much better offensive rebounder than he has any right to be. He will come flying in from the corners to dive into the scrum.
“That’s just all effort,” he said, joking that teammates are learning from it.
Derrick White, sitting next to Pritchard, shook his head.
“He ain’t lying,” White added.
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Pritchard’s size does make him a target on defense. He has still found a way to contribute on that end of the floor.
“He can change the game by picking up full court, by offensive rebounding, by shooting, by defensive ball pressure,” Mazzulla said. “He just wants to do whatever it takes to make an impact on the game.
“It’s a credit to him coming into every game ready to impact winning.”
Payton Pritchard scored five points within 40 seconds of checking in against the Hawks. That’s what he’s known for. But look at his pick up points during that first stint.
He’s 6-foot-1 yet finds ways to contribute on defense. pic.twitter.com/sN9dbBBev3
— Steph Noh (@StephNoh) November 5, 2024
“He’s an underrated defender, he will pick you up full-court, he’s really physical,” Rivers said in his postgame comments. “He just brings so much to that team.”
Pritchard’s shooting shows up on the highlight reels, but the improvements in his game remain unseen by most. It’s been his defense, rebounding and unselfishness that have gotten him into the rotation. Most of all, it was what he did when nobody was watching in his lowest moments, going back to the only solution he’s ever known.
“If you don’t take it that way, you might be out of the league. So I just put my head down and worked.”