Transcription
I waited a night to say this publicly because I have so much respect for Bam Adabio. He plays so hard every dribble of every game. Nobody sweats harder and more than Bam Attabio. He leads the league every year in ounces sweated. And I have nothing but the highest regard for how much bigger he plays than his 6'9 in frame. He battles his ass off every night at the five for the Miami Heat. And he has made three all-star teams in nine years. Not bad. And he has made one first team all defense. Was pretty great. Along with four other second team all D's. Way to go. And one year his best year he averaged just over 20 points a game. So you blend the ability to score 20 a game with the ability to be first team all defense, you got a pretty great player. Played in two finals. Didn't win them, but played in two. And in the second playoff run to the finals, he did average 22 a game, 18 a game the first time around. It's it's a really good career. Not all-time great, but really really good. And and it deserved the exclamation point that got put on it a night ago at home against Washington. I I loved it for Bam that he can now put a big 83 at the top of his resume. 83 points in one game. I love all that for him because I I honor what what he's achieved in this league for nine years. And I do love his coach, Spo. And I love how Spo has taught him, coached him, guided him. to a a high level of greatness.
But I slept on it and I thought about it all day. I haven't read anybody else's opinion about it. I just know mine. I love this game. I love this league. Sometimes I think I I love it even more than I love the National Football League. Started covering the Lakers out here in LA. 1977. Been doing it a long time. Love it. Live for it. Breathe it. I watched the last I don't know as soon as I saw the alerts. I I watched the last seven, eight minutes of that game last night, leaving behind the Laker game and it just didn't sit well with me. I'm watching him just hunting and pecking and scratching and clawing for every shot, every point. Remember, he's not a great jump shooter. He's a career 31% from three and he made seven of 22. So I guess he was pretty much right on schedule, right in his in his niche for hitting threes, but he's attacking the basket and he's getting to the free throw line at an all-time record rate just because he was playing so much harder than the sorry ass Wizards were playing on this night. They're now 15 and 48. They're the second worst defensive team. And for whatever reason, he just wanted to play a lot harder than they did on this given night. And he wound up taking 43 shots. But more important, he took 43 free throws. He got to the free throw line, shot 43 and made 36, which is just sensational. It's It's just hard to make 36 of 43 free throws when you're a career high 70s% shooter. That was a night that that was his crazy night. That was his three-point long two-point sort of night. It came at the free throw line when he made 36 of those. Had 43 points at halftime, 40 in the second half. Still had a little room for error in there. could have poured it on even more.
It just shook me up to watch Spo clapping for him. I think he was half-heartedly clapping because he knew what was going on. He knew in the grand scheme of things this was an embarrassment for the National Basketball Association. I wasn't in awe of what I was watching. I was in shock. This just seemed wrong. This seemed cheap. This seemed Mickey Mouse. This seemed rinky dink. I felt like I was watching some high school game in which some kid who's going to get a D1 scholarship and become a pretty good college player is averaging 35 a game for his large school, large class high school team. and they play one team in the conference that can barely feel five guys to play and it's such a joke of a mismatch that the kid averaging 35 can score 83 but he's just jacking it every time he shoots it from distance from three from long two. This was very different than that. This was just one man playing harder than anybody else on the other team wanted to play on that given night. It almost felt like the Wizards in the second half got into playing Globe Trotters, the Generals opposite the Globe Trotters, the set decoration. Even though down the stretch they were doubling him, tripling him, chasing him, but in the end when he passed Kobe Bean Bryant, the late and the great, the closest thing to Jordan I ever saw, it was just wrong. It was sacriiggious. It was desecrating Kobe's 81. It It almost came across like graffiti on the tombstone for me. 81 was hallowed. Wilts 100 is is somewhere else. It's like alien. It's it's maybe someday Wimbley will score 80 something. But Will playing a against a bunch of little white guys in his day. big dip ring, finger rolling in, shot after shot. He was such a mismatch that that was like that high school game that I described against the Little Sisters of the Poor team. Hershey, Pennsylvania 100 against the Knicks. You listening, Stephen A? God. But to pass for for for a guy who's not known as a scorer who averages 18 16 for his career, 20 in his best season ever to score 83 in in a quote unquote real NBA game. Not a preseason game, not a exhibition. No, this is this counted. It it was just sacrilege. It it it just felt like it it turned the NBA into a joke for one night. That game was a joke game.
Look, if if Shay Gilis Alexander had gotten hot, he's he's just a a pretty good three-point shooter, except when it's time to make him, he will make them right there with anybody who's ever played the game. But he's by most standards an average three. He doesn't try. He's not a high volume three-point shooter. if he'd gotten hot and made 10 or 12 threes and and just made every two that he looked at got going and and scored 83, you'd say, "Okay, way to go." And and it's it's all striking around the globe. People would be in awe of that. If Luca had just gone crazy hot from three, which he occasionally does and and just ballhoged and and and just high volumed it to death for one night and god, you want to talk about usage rate. He leads the league in usage rate. If he just had the ball in his hands, if they just let him shoot it every time and he scored 83, you'd say, "Okay, I got it." I' I'd be I'd be amazed if Steph had gotten healthy and and just started bombing threes and made I don't know 20 threes which he's highly capable of making in a night. Then if he gets to 83, you say, "Wow." You'd say, "Wow." You'd say, you'd be buzzing about it for a week. I don't know. Joker. Maybe maybe he just goes berserk and he he's just spinning and wheeling and making every shot and and he makes 10 12 threes which he's highly capable of making. Yeah. Okay. I'm good. Ant-Man. If he gets hot from three and scores 83, I'm fine with that. Maybe even Donovan Mitchell. I I'd say Kawhai. I just don't know if he has the knees to get through the You'd have to play 40. You know, Bam played what? 42 minutes. He was averaging 31.7. 31.7. He played 42. Okay. If Kawawaii could play 45 minutes and and just get hot from two where he's just making every two and and 10 threes. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Then then we're all good. We're cool. We're wideeyed. We're But Bam Adabio, no disrespect to him and his game, but this is not his game. This desecrated 81, which had become a sacred number for me. It's almost like Bay Ruth 60 became sacred to so many people. Late great Henry Aaron. Don't don't get me started. But but that it's that kind of a number to me for the longest I grew up with 60 was was just it was reverential. It was sacred. 81 to me was sacred because it stood for what Kobe was. And I know it was against another bad team, bad night, Toronto Raptors. I got it. But but it was Kobe being Bryant at his greatest. You you can argue at you know, at at his highest killer instinct where yeah, he's killing a bad team, but but it's just what he did. It was Mamba mentality. Just run a muk all over the Raptors. Mamba mentality.
I it's just hard for me to to live with the fact that that now I have to look at the alltime scores and there's Wilt. It's another galaxy, another another world from us. That that that world is gone. And he was an alien just like Wimi is. He he was an alien when when there were there were no players close to the alien that he was. At least Wimi, at least the Thunder can can make him work for his points. Wilt, nobody could really make him work except for the great Bill Russell who was probably about 68 maybe to Wilt's 71. Bill Russell could just outwork Wilt, out out savvy him, outthink him, outwill him. That's what he did to Wilt. And he psychologically owned Wilt. So no alien there. But the point is that that this was just this was just a sad night for the NBA. And I got to get it out there that that I This hurt me all day and I wasn't going to say this publicly and then I just couldn't help myself because it it desecrated the game that I love. It it made it feel silly. That's what it made it feel like. Silliness like like something's wrong with it now. Like it's it's falling. It's fading. It's It's losing its luster. It's It's It ain't what it used to be. I just didn't see this one coming and I still can't quite wrap my mind around it. And my emotions are so mixed because I do love the man who scored the 83. He did deserve to have respect at you know, the ultimate respect attached to his name and his legacy and he got it, I guess. I mean, this will be what he will be known for. In fact, if it was close to whether he'd be it seemed like everybody gets in the basketball hall of fame, but but if it if it was close about does Bam belong in the Hall of Fame without a if he ends up not winning a champ, maybe he will, but th this would put him way over the top, right? Oh, but he scored 83. I'm happy for that. I'm I'm happy that he's Mr. 83. From this point on in his life, he's Mr. 83. He's second on that list to one guy who's who doesn't even qualify to belong on the list, Will Chamberlain. I just hate this for the game. I love the sport. I love and the Kobe I still love. This was just wrong.