Now this is the kind of stat-stuffing performance I was unreasonably expecting regularly from Bam Adebayo this season. Truthfully, I let his Summer League performances distort my expectations, a rookie mistake. What am I, some kind of casual who things that Summer League means anything? I, as a season vet of watching role-players, should know better. But I saw him handling the ball, doing guard-like things, and you know who I thought of? Giannis. And I wanted to believe.
It took a while, but now SL Adebayo is here. 16/11/8/0/4. That’s a statline if I’ve ever seen one. That’s Giannis-esque. I hate to compare every single smooth-moving big with passing ability to him (Pascal Siakam says hi), but it’s hard not to when even some of these players mention that they modeled their game after him (didn’t help Christian Wood, but whatever). Adebayo is just the latest in a long line of such players, trading some of the paint moves for raw athletic dunkage.
As you might expect, a lot of these assists are kinda lame. He’s not breaking down the defense and finding open teammates as people collase on him. But he’s making the right passes (except for his five turnovers, which were maybe the wrong passes), and that’s how Nikola Jokic gets most of his assists these days, anyway.
Actually, forget about the Giannis comparisons. We’re moving to Jokic comparisons. How does an athletic-er, faster, springier, and American-er Jokic sound to you? Sounds pretty frickin’ good to me.