Kiwi Steve in the NBA #9: Refreshed
See, all it took was a bit of rest. No sooner had Steven Adams come back from eight days off during the All Star break, apparently largely spent training his new dog, than he’d ripped back into it for the Thunder at the level we’d been hoping to see from him all season ever since he barnstormed his way through preseason. With at least 15 points in each of his first four games after the break (which he was on track to make five but for, you know, dumb game circumstances) he set a streak that he’s only bettered twice in his entire career – both in the first half of last season when he was getting fringe all star consideration. The rest of his numbers were flowing nicely too. Those first four games back, these were his averages...
29 MIN | 17.8 PTS (65.1 FG%, 75.0 FT%) | 11.8 REB | 1.3 AST | 2.0 STL | 1.3 BLK
All while also averaging fewer than one turnover and one personal foul per game. It started with 19p & 17r against the Denver Nuggets as the Thunder withstood 32 points from Nikola Jokic to surge home with a dominant fourth quarter, Chris Paul leading the way with 29 points as a record seven Thunder players scored in double figures. 10 of Adams’ points came in that fourth quarter. A massive win against a top their team in the conference and they chased that up with their biggest ever win over the San Antonio Spurs. Adams had 21 points and 14 rebounds, throwing down a one-handed alley-oop from Dennis Schröder early in the fourth which extended the lead out to 27 points and the starters wouldn’t have much more to do in this one.
Even in the Chicago game where Adams’ numbers were a little lower than the rest, his overall impact a little less obvious, he came home strong with a number of dominant plays in the fourth quarter as the Thunder avoided blowing a win that looked in the bag when they were 17 points up at half-time. Just another example of OKC doing the business in a close game – they’re 18-9 in games decided by six points or less.
That was followed with a scrappy win over the Sacramento Kings, another strong second half doing the trick following an intimidating early deficit, which made it 4/4 since the break and five wins in a row all up... although then they travelled to Milwaukee to face the reigning MVP and the team with the best record in the NBA and the Bucks did it easy. Giannis Antetokounmpo completely dominating. The Bucks have only lost three home games all season and never even copped a scare in this 133-86 win. Adams only played 17 minutes... though he did have by far the best on-court +/- of the starters. Being a -5 in a 47 point defeat is certainly a lot better than it could have been.
That Milwaukee game was a bit of a splash of cold water. As great as the Thunder have been, exceeding all expectations and rising up to fifth in the West prior to this latest defeat, this was a sharp skid to a halt that shows they’ve still got a way to go if they wanna be going further than the first or maybe second round. A flash of reality, you could say. But having said that this team is 29-12 since December 6 which is a full half season’s worth of sustained quality to prove it’s absolutely no fluke that they’re sitting where they are on that ladder. 29 wins from 41 games, that’s a winning percentage on pace for 58 wins over a full season (duh). This doesn’t erase the early struggles but it does show how they’ve overcome them.
Mate, but we’ve talked plenty about the team’s achievements... finally we’ve got some Steven Adams sustained excellence to talk about too. Having played through all manner of niggling injuries throughout the campaign he shaped as one player who needed that All Star Break more than most so for him to return looking so bloody dominant... *chef’s kiss*. He’s had games like these scattered around the whole term, it’s this level of consistency that we’ve been missing. The day in/day out production. He’ll still fluctuate in his scoring particularly because of the number of scorers on this roster and 17 rebounds in a game is obviously an outlier. That’s fine. But the energy and the influence of the man has been on a new level this last week or two and you know where it’s been noticed as much as anywhere? Free throw shooting, dude. Free throw shooting.
Adams has made 15 of 20 free throws since the break. It’s a trend that’s been on the upwards all season to be fair, rising with every subsequent month. From 28.6% in October to 47.6% in November to 57.9% in December to 70.8% in January and in February he’s so far hitting them at 75.0%... a distinct improvement each time. Not sure what to make of that but it’s lovely to see. Of course we’ve seen him have extended streaks of decent FT% before and then suddenly follow that with an extended streak of utter trash from the stripe but the steady improvements so far suggest something different for once. Fingers crossed anyway.
Chris Paul, after the Nuggets game: “Steven was amazing, man. Mo Cheeks told me early in the game, ‘Look at Steven.’”
Billy Donovan, after the Spurs game: “Steven [Adams] did a really good job tonight. I think when Steven plays like he has the last two games, both on the offensive and defensive side, I think it really just takes our team to a different level.”
A different level. Pretty interesting to think about what a fully refreshed Steven Adams might offer to a Thunder team who were already playing pretty damn well while he was hobbled.
Aotearoa’s Biggest UFC Fan
So... you may not realise this. But Steven Adams is a very, very big fan of the ol’ combat sports. In particular he’s a Mixed Martial Arts devotee, in fact it’s one of the rare pursuits of his that he actually tweets about. There was the tale a little while back too where he attributed his boxing out ability to studying Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and how they use body weight in that sport... although he also said it was purely studious since the Thunder wouldn’t actually allow him to do BJJ for risk of injury. Plus there was the night last season when the Thunder played away to the Philadelphia 76ers on a Saturday arvo, got the win, then a bunch of them zipped over to Brooklyn for UFC Fight Night 143. Henry Cejudo vs T.J. Dillashaw was the main event that night and Adams was one of five players that attended along with Russell Westbrook, Paul George, Ray Felton, and Jerami Grant... none of whom would still be Thunder players six months later.
Note Steven Adams wearing his typical Steven Adams-faced slides there. What a guy. But while the rest of the lads were all having a lovely evening, Steven Adams was getting a bit more out of it. He was the appointed expert as the telly coverage stepped over to have a word just as he was the established authority that time in the Thunder dressing room when Russell Westbrook interrupted a media scrum to ask Steve-o who was gonna win the fight that night. Might have even been the same night, can’t remember. Westbrook and Adams had a bit of a shared fandom in that area, to be fair.
So with UFC Auckland taking place last weekend it only made sense for Steven Adams to emerge as a bit of a hype man. In fact the dude even got to pop up on Ariel Helwani’s show for a quick chat – AH has done some basketball coverage for ESPN on occasion too so there you go.
Couple great stories in there. Old mate chatting some in depth knowledge. But the coolest story of the lot is that he actually goes way back with Izzy Adesanya, all the way back to Rotorua. Adesanya’s a couple years older than Steve but used to run with a crew that involved Adams’ sister from back when Adesanya was big into hip hop dancing. There’s actually a video from last year of Izzy’s preparation for the Robert Whittaker fight which includes a section filmed at a fundraising event for Steven Adams’ basketball camps. You see Adams giving an into speech, you see a few glimpses of the glitz and glamour around, and you get a bit of a fly on the wall view of Stevie chatting with Dan Hooker and Adesanya, with Israel telling him he remembers meeting him when he was just 13 years old (“same height!”). How about that one, aye? Two of the absolute most successful and globally renowned kiwi sportsmen on the planet right now and they can trace a shared path back all the way to then. Pretty incredible.
Anyway, if you wanna know more about how UFC Auckland went down then have a read of this and have a listen to this.
New Kicks
First off, of course they’re camo. It wouldn’t be Steven Adams if there wasn’t some camo in the outfit. But also this is a bit of a rare occurrence. Adams doesn’t change his shoes very often. Some NBA players crack out a new pair for every single game but Adams is one of those tough guys who wear a single pair until he they rip... his previous fave being a pair of Adidas D Rose 7s which is tricky because they don’t actually make those any more.
It was the width of those shoes that enticed him in the first place so if he’s run down his last pair of DR7s then obviously he needed to find a new hero... settling on this pair of Adidas Harden Vol. 4s. The camo was just a pretty touch. Two things on the shoe change, first of all he makes one three pointer and he’s wearing Hardens now, honestly. Second of all ain’t it funny that he was actually drafted with a pick from the James Harden trade that sent the bearded one to Houston? The NBA is really weird sometimes.
If you want a pair of these bad boys, they’re actually 30% off on the Adidas NZ website at the mo’ and will only set you back $154 instead of $220... which is cool because if you’ve got that kinda spare change lying around then perhaps we can interest you in chipping in some of that 30% on The Niche Cache’s Patreon page so we can nudge a little closer to our goal of 50 Patrons?
BOX SCORES
vs DENVER NUGGETS (W 113-101):
32 MIN | 19 PTS (7/14 FG, 5/6 FT) | 17 REB (7 OFF) | 2 AST | 4 STL | 2 BLK
vs SAN ANTONIO SPURS (W 131-103):
27 MIN | 21 PTS (8/12 FG, 5/6 FT) | 14 REB (3 OFF) | 1 STL | 1 TO
at CHICAGO BULLS (W 142-122):
28 MIN | 16 PTS (6/8 FG, 4/6 FT) | 9 REB (5 OFF) | 2 AST | 3 STL | 3 BLK | 1 TO | 1 PF
vs SACRAMENTO KINGS (W 112-108):
28 MIN | 15 PTS (7/9 FG, 1/2 FT) | 7 REB (6 OFF) | 1 AST | 1 TO | 2 PF
at MILWAUKEE BUCKS (L 133-86):
17 MIN | 8 PTS (4/5 FG) | 7 REB (1 OFF) | 3 AST | 1 STL | 1 TO | 1 PF
THE SCHEDULE
vs LOS ANGELES CLIPPERS, Wednesday at 2pm (NZT)
at DETROIT PISTONS, Thursday at 1pm (NZT)
at NEW YORK KNICKS, Saturday at 1.30pm (NZT)
at BOSTON CELTICS, Monday at 11am (NZT)
vs UTAH JAZZ, Thursday at 1pm (NZT)
SLAM DUNKS
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