Russell Westbrook may have worked very hard to show the entire world that triple-doubles are a near-worthless statistical non-achievement that any player can get as long as they try (or statpad) hard enough, but that doesn’t mean that I’m not getting excited to witness the birth of yet another triple-double machine in the NBA.
Often, after a player gets their first triple-double, they say to themselves “say, that wasn’t so hard at all, it felt like just a normal game for me!” and then they go out there and get some more. It happened with Nikola Jokic. It happened with Ben Uzoh (not really). It happened with Giannis Antetokounmpo. It happened with Delon Wright. And now it is happening with Bam Adebayo.
10 assists isn’t even that many, when you think about how many shots are made by the average team in the average NBA game. And it gets even easier once you tell your teammates that you really would prefer it if they shot the ball as soon as you pass it to them. That is what Adebayo is finding out right now. Just grab the rebound, dribble it up the court, pass it to a guy, and have that guy shoot. Couldn’t be easier. That exact method is called the “Westbrook Method” of acquiring triple-doubles; there are other methods with varying degrees of efficacy (the “Scalabrine Method” is not recommended for general use).