Kiwi Steve in the NBA #6: Life In The Post-Russ Era
Panic Attacks
The 2019 portion of the 2019-20 season didn’t get off to the best start for Steven Adams. A knee contusion meant that all the big expectations of preseason swiftly turned into confusion as he played through an unannounced injury which clearly affected his shooting ability and by the time it was revealed what he was dealing with the whole situation was a letdown. We were pretty much put in a holding pattern until he recovered... which by the start of December he seemed to have done so and suddenly the numbers began to soar.
So it was a bloody shame that he could only last seven minutes against the Toronto Raptors recently. Seven minutes and a whole lot of worry as another knee contusion (or possibly the same one?) ruled him out of the entire second half and considering how much he was hobbled through October/November it was really not one to take lightly. Not particularly clear how it happened but Adams himself signalled that he needed to come out of the game and that was that.
It obviously didn’t help OKC against the Raptors. Nerlens Noel was already out with an ankle sprain which meant a lot of Mike Muscala at the five, as well as Justin Patton who’d been recalled from the G-League due to Noel’s status. Muscala scored 17 points which is his best for OKC but Marc Gasol and Serge Ibaka both scored 15 points with 13/20 shooting between the two of them. The Thunder were able to rally to within three points with a couple minutes left having trailed by as many as 30 but the Raptors closed it out to win by nine.
Adams then sat out the next game which was the natural precaution to take although he returned for the following one against the Trail Blazers albeit on a minutes restriction. He might have also been on one of those restrictions against the Rockets too but we didn’t get to find out after his horrid luck with injuries continued. Clint Capela absolutely bulldozed him from behind contesting a rebound less than two minutes into the game. Steve was knocked to the ground and his wobbliness as he got back to his feet was an instant bad sign. Here’s the incident...
He went down to the locker room as the play was reviewed and ruled a flagrant foul, though Adams did come back to shoot his free throws – as required or else he’d have been automatically ruled out of the rest of the game (he missed both). It was his ankle where the damage was done, despite what looked like an elbow to the head and also the large frame of Capela falling on top of him as he went down. Initially he was questionable, then he was ruled out. Expect to hear the scope of the damage in the next day or two after they’ve had some time to figure it out, let the swelling go down or get into some scans or whatever needs to happen. Fingers crossed.
Incredibly the Thunder rallied from a big deficit to actually win that game in Houston, despite Noel also being out and Patton having gone back to the G-League. Mike Muscala was their only proper centre other than Gallinari as a makeshift... but they outscored Houston 41-20 in the fourth quarter to win it by five points. A shocking collapse from the home team to be honest. They’re going through a rough patch at the moment, losing four straight, and it wasn’t helped by James Harden shooting 1/17 from deep in this game. He shoots 3/17, as bad as that would still be, and they win this. Oh well, what a shame. Lol.
Old Mate Russ
This Thunder season has been a pretty fascinating one. It wasn’t supposed to be, they were meant to be a tame if competitive losing team that could beat a playoff team if they dropped their game but otherwise would live in the lottery with all their hoarded future draft picks. Except that everything’s kinda clicked into place instead. Chris Paul playing great, Billy Donovan coaching his arse off, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander breaking through, Dan Gallinari hitting shots, Steven Adams throwing dimes all over the show.
It’s also a very different offence. A lot more ball movement and structure, with the scoring spread out nicely between CP3, Gally, SGA, and of course the most surprise package of the lot of them: the sixth man of the year campaign of Dennis Schröder. Which makes it very easy to look at how much fun this team is currently and point the finger at the lack of Russell Westbrook. After all, he was the personification of the triple double these last few years, with one of the all time biggest usage rates. He absolutely dominated things but without him here they are sharing the load and having fun. I mean, just look at this...
Last season Paul George scored 28 points per game and Russell Westbrook averaged a triple double with 22.9 points per game. They were the only guys scored more than 16ppg and they were taking 20+ shots per night. This season nobody is taking more than 15.5 shots per game (SGA) and four different players are averaging between 16-20 points per game. That means there’s less of a fluctuation based on the whims of one or two guys shooting... if Chris Paul is off his game then SGA can take over and if he’s not feeling it then there’s Schrody or Gallo. But that’s just a matter of sharing, the revolution goes deeper than that.
OKC under Russ’ guidance were the sixth quickest team in Pace of Play last season... this time they’re 24th. Their overall shooting percentages have improved though have dropped slightly from 3pt range, though most drastically they’ve gone from being the top ranked offensive rebounding team to the last ranked. That’s kinda crazy... and it shows the difference that Westbrook’s whirlwind athleticism can offer (an injured Steven Adams hasn’t helped). Steals are way down too for a similar reason, remember they’re also doing this without DPOY candidate Paul George.
One major boost though... the foul counts have dropped by heaps. From 24th in the league up to 3rd and that’s a useful indication because fouls are one of those ones you can control with more discipline. Some fouls are earned by opponents, some are given away. This team is less talented than last year’s was and so a lot of the stats have dropped for that reason but they understand that and are doing a fine job of maximising their abilities through that discipline and self-awareness. Playing slower probably helps decision making too.
This ain’t throwing darts at Russell Westbrook though. It’s just different. OKC were plenty of fun with Westbrook in full rampage mode too and they’re no more or less entertaining because they’re playing a trendier offence without the one-man-show (plus PG13). And we’ve especially gotta be careful in making comparisons until we see how this lot go in the playoffs because, realistically, it’s hard to see them winning a first round series unless they can get up to at least the sixth seed. Adoring this iteration for losing in the first round (supposing they get that far) and ripping on the other for achieving the same thing is a bit silly.
Still, it’s crazy impressive to see how comfortably stepped out from the shadow of Russ. It helps that he left on good terms and with assets coming back the other way, with all parties accepting that an era had ended, but plenty of teams have struggled to get past the loss of a franchise icon before and plenty more will in the future. The Thunder adapted quick and that’s a testament to the lot of them.
On the other side of things, it took some time for the weirdness of Russell Westbrook playing for a different team to wear off but at least he had James Harden there next to him for familiarity. Now, Russ’ game merging with the Houston style of things hasn’t exactly been a slam dunk partnership and you’d be well entitled to have serious concerns about their potential (which go far beyond Russ’ fit and get into all sorts of personnel strangeness – shopping Capela and not extending PJ Tucker, etc.)... but those are debates for another website to have. The focus here is Russ’ first return to Oklahoma City as an opposition player and with all sides relatively comfortable with the reasoning behind his trade it meant for some emotional scenes...
Man, Steve-o sharing the Nick Collison handshake was an unexpected one. That’s sweet.
Anyway OKC won that game and then also beat Houston in Houston a few games later (bookending the scope of this article). Westbrook did get a triple double in the second of those games which means he now joins LeBron James as the only two fellas to have TD’d against all 30 current NBA franchises. A nice milestone.
But yeah point here is just to highlight the diverging paths of Russell Westbrook and the OKC Thunder. It’s a real crossroads moment for this franchise and with the draft picks they’ve got stored up and some of the players on this roster and their growth (not to mention a coach whose stocks are rising fast) there’s a lot to be excited about. That shouldn’t detract from Westbrook’s legacy regardless of what happens in Houston but it does show that Sam Presti pressed the button at an opportunistic time.
Speaking of old teammates, Westbrook and his OKC buddies seem to be getting on a whole lot better than Kevin Durant and Kendrick Perkins, a couple fellas from way back in Steve’s rookie year. Those two clashed on twitter – both always pretty active on that forum – over the very predictable point of KD being soft for joining the Warriors or whatever, it’s all kinda tiresome and it’s unlikely either took it as seriously as the people who stumbled upon it... a sentiment that Steve summed up pretty simply...
Some Nice Words
Billy Donovan: “He's done a good job, I give him a lot of credit from the standpoint that playing with Russell [Westbrook], who is just so aggressive going to the basket, Steven got a lot of offensive rebounds, cleaning up misses or Russell dumped it off to him. We have a different team right now with nine new players, so we've had to change stylistically some of the things that we were doing and a lot of it has been with Steven. I give him a lot of credit that he's done a really good job of doing some things that we've asked him to do that maybe he hasn't done a whole lot of in his career and he's done a nice job of that so far.”
Enes Kanter to Forbes: “When me and [Steve] went against each other in practice, it was like a wrestling match. For me, whenever I go out there against other big men, the game becomes so easy because I used to go against a guy like that. He does the same thing — get position early, boxing the guy out and then he has all those kinds of tricks. So it helped for sure.”
The Niche Cast x Steven Adams
In case ya missed it.
BOX SCORES
vs HOUSTON ROCKETS (W 113-92):
25 MIN | 15 PTS (6/8 FG, 3/4 FT) | 8 REB (1 OFF) | 3 AST } 1 STL | 1 TO | 1 PF
vs LOS ANGELES LAKERS (L 125-110):
29 MIN | 12 PTS (6/10 FG) | 8 REB (2 OFF) | 1 AST | 2 STL | 1 BLK | 1 TO
at MINNESOTA TIMBERWOLVES (W 117-104):
29 MIN | 13 PTS (5/7 FG, 3/4 FT) | 11 REB (4 OFF) | 5 AST | 1 STL | 3 BLK | 2 TO | 1 PF
vs TORONTO RAPTORS (L 130-121):
7 MIN | 2 PTS (1/1 FG) | 2 REB (0 OFF) | 1 AST | 1 STL | 1 TO
vs MIAMI HEAT (L 115-108):
DNP – Knee Contusion
vs PORTLAND TRAIL BLAZERS (W 119-106):
24 MIN | 5 PTS (1/7 FG, 3/4 FT) | 9 REB (5 OFF) | 3 AST | 3 TO | 2 PF
at HOUSTON ROCKETS (W 112-107):
2 MIN | 0 PTS (0/2 FG, 0/2 FT)
THE SCHEDULE
at ORLANDO MAGIC, Thursday at 1pm (NZT)
vs ATLANTA HAWKS, Saturday at 2pm (NZT)
at MINNESOTA TIMBERWOLVES, Sunday at 2pm (NZT)
vs DALLAS MAVERICKS, Tuesday at 2pm (NZT)
at SACRAMENTO KINGS, Thursday at 4pm (NZT)
SLAM DUNKS
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