Bam Adebayo did it. He was selected to the All-Star game, and even if he gets catastrophically injured between now and the All-Star break (by the way, I am not superstitious at all and you shouldn’t be either) and doesn’t actually play in the game, that selection will always be there adorning his career. “Bam Adebayo: All-Star” is now a fully truthful statement to make, and it will be until the end of time and probably past the end of time, depending on if you think logical constructs still hold in the absence of a universe to contain them.
It seems obvious in hindsight that he would get the nod, given the lack of bigman talent in the East right now, but I was still slightly nervous that the NBA would mess up and give it to a worse player. The All-Star game rosters of years past are riddled with questionable decisions when you get to the last few guys, but this year, things look pretty good. A few snubs (the league is basically telling Devin Booker “you can score as many points as you want but you’re not getting in the All-Star game until you drop 100”), but nothing as outrageous as leaving Adebayo out in favor of, like, Brook Lopez or something.
Lopez, I love you man, but why did you forget how to shoot threes?
Adebayo doesn’t have that problem. Supposedly he’s kinda working on his outside shot, but when you can dominate in the paint and still be a massively positive player without it, why bother? In the meantime, we’re seeing more and more of those mini midrange jumpers. Some of them are really mini, inside the free-throw line even, but each one that he makes gives him more and more confidence in that part of his game. Which is good, because eventually those stupid assists off handoffs won’t happen as often if he doesn’t make teams at least kind of respect his outside shot.