It happened on the final play of a two-point loss to the Phoenix Suns. The Memphis Grizzlies were trying to avoid a second straight defeat having had their 11-game winning streak broken a few days earlier against the LA Lakers. A pair of Dario Saric free throws had put Phoenix up by four points but then Desmond Bane halved that deficit with a wheeling lay-up making use of Steven Adams’ sealing presence under the rim (Adams didn’t even really do much, his presence alone was enough to keep his man from helping on Bane).

So it was that the Suns had the ball with 7.6 seconds remaining. Cam Johnson collected the inbounds pass (a bloke soon to be traded for Kevin Durant, shout out Sean Marks) and was immediately double-teamed near the sideline by Memphis’s two top defenders: Dillon Brooks and Steven Adams (okay, that’s a bit of a joke... but don’t let Jaren Jackson Jr’s block rates hide how important those other two are, usually both personally taking on the toughest match-ups that their opponents have to offer).

The Grizzlies could have fouled but they sniffed a chance for a steal. Brooks and Adams got CJ backtracking and were able to poke the ball free. Adams dove to save it from bouncing out of play, flicking it back behind him. However Dario Saric got there first for the Suns and by then the clock had expired anyway. Game over. A valiant last-ditch effort play... but it cost both Adams and the Memphis Grizzlies dearly as he landed hard on his right kneecap and didn’t immediately get back up.

When he did rise to his feet again, he was helped in part by his old teammate Chris Paul (as well as a heap of Grizz players). Nice touch from CP3. Alas, Adams limped off the court amidst the post-game assemblage and two days later came this update from the Memphis Grizzlies PR unit...

“Memphis Grizzlies center Steven Adams has been diagnosed with a PCL sprain in his right knee, which was sustained during the January 22 game against the Phoenix Suns. Adams is expected to be sidelined for 3-5 weeks. Further updates will be provided as appropriate.”

That was roughly four weeks ago, putting us smack bang in the middle of the timetable for return. There’s been a convenient All Star break of late which saved him from missing another handful of games during his absence. He was still firmly out of contention leading up to the break but all along he’s been working hard towards a return in practice. Not to mention travelling with the team. Memphis do play Joel Embiid and the Philadelphia 76ers next so his presence would clearly be a welcome one, although even if that game comes too soon for him he should be ready to go before much longer.

Absence Makes The Heart Grow Fonder

In the meantime... nobody who’s reading this article should be surprised about this but it hasn’t been pretty without the big fella. The first game after he was hurt saw the Grizz blown out by 33 points against the Sacramento Kings. There have also been double-figure losses against the Timberwolves, Trail Blazers, Cavaliers, and Celtics. In the 11 games of without Adams the Grizzlies have a 4-7 record... although it’s a credit to their previous form that they still hold the second seed in the Western Conference coming out of the All Star Break. The Grizz have 25 more games remaining. A little over a quarter of the regular season to go.

What this Steven Adams injury has done is really hammer home his importance to this team. He’s not the athletic playmaker that Ja Morant is. He’s not the knockdown three-point shooter that Desmond Bane is. He’s not the terrorising on-ball defender that Dillon Brooks is. He’s not the stretch big-man with elite shot-blocking capabilities that Jaren Jackson is. What Steven Adams is, is the bloke who makes all of those guys better at what they do. He’s the drummer in the band. He’s the mortar in the brick wall. He’s the rug that ties the room together.

Former Pelicans teammate JJ Redick knows exactly what’s up...

Perhaps the most incredible part of all this is how Adams has missed eleven straight games and yet he still leads the entire NBA in total offensive rebounds... and by a healthy margin too. The chasing pack had all that time to close the gap and haven’t been able to catch him. Adams has 214. Ivica Zubac is next with 196 followed by Mason Plumlee with 189. Obviously his per games and percentage stats haven’t been affected so he remains on track to repeat his Offensive Rebounding Triple Crown.

He has dipped back into fourth for overall rebounds per game and his total screen assists aren’t what they would have been, now 71 behind leader Domantas Sabonis (though Adams leads the way in per game and per 36-min screen assist metrics). These are renowned Steven Adams proficiencies, nothing much to learn about that. What he have learned instead is what the Memphis Grizzlies look like without those things in their line-up.

Refer to the StatsMuse yarn that JJR subsequently shredded. The ‘Shannon Sharpe Incident’ happened in the game before Adams was injured. Almost but not quite perfectly aligned. So for clarity’s sake, here instead is a selection of stats specifically from before and after the Adams injury...

The post-Jan 22 numbers are based on each team’s past 11 games, since that’s how many the Grizz have played in that time. There’ll be some overlap with the dates there but this way gives a better comparison for the Grizzlies in relation to their rivals. The pre-Jan 22 is inclusive of that date and has no other limitations.

What you notice there is that, of those selected stats (and a lot of them are just the basics), literally the only thing that’s been better without Steven Adams is the team’s free throw shooting... and even then only by a marginal amount. Not only that but so many of these numbers have seen massive drop-offs without him. Way more than you could blame on the small-ish sample size.

That includes areas like three-point shooting and points per game where Adams’ individual contribution isn’t reflected at all in his personal box scores. He’s not a shooter... but he still creates spacing through his screens (which is equally as useful as a stretch shooter drawing defensive attention – an open shot is an open shot no matter how you muster it). He’s not a scorer... but he’s a master facilitator in his own way.

Some of their other defensive efforts have been quite stable. Blocks and steals and points off turnovers, that kinda stuff. Regardless, they’re allowing more points and that could be as simple as giving up more possessions (and thus more shots) due to their weaker rebounding. Fine margins like that are what decide games night in and night out. Adams does so many little things that, as his coach always says, “contribute towards winning basketball”.

And as we can see they’ve been a wee bit shithouse without him.

The New Stache Bros

The blossoming camaraderie between Steven Adams and John Konchar has popped up many times in these here articles this season. They’re two blokes with a similar sense of humour, pretty much taking the piss out of each other on the regular...

But let it be known that Steve-o’s also got a mentor/mateship thing going with Santi Aldama. The Spaniard had a great start to the season while Jaren Jackson Jr was injured. That performance burst began in preseason and then carried on from there. At the time Steven Adams summed it up like this...

“He's playing pretty good. He shaved his eyebrows so he can see now”

Have a giggle at that. And then also note that a man with bushy eyebrows probably grows a mean moustache too. Adams himself has been working his way back from that knee injury, no doubt bored out of his mind and looking for fresh antics to occupy his mind. He’s still been travelling and training (in limited capacity) with the team so he’s been amongst all the banter. Santi Aldama is a hirsute gentleman like himself. One plus one plus one equals three and next thing you know...

It’s just like the good old days with Enes Kanter, aye?

Dunno how much contact Stevie still has with ol’ Enes, who has sorta lost his mind since dipping out of the NBA. Painted himself as a social justice warrior stemming from his genuine courage speaking out against the regime back in his homeland of Turkey but soon coming to focus way too much on other the perceived hypocrisy of other players rather than standing for anything much himself. Needless to say, it wasn’t long before the American right wing media latched onto him and now Kanter’s out there on Fox News every now and then claiming he’s been blackballed from the NBA for his politics (as opposed to his declining production).

So we’ll let that old friendship bounce safely out of play and stick to the here and now. There’s a new moustache duel in town between Adams and another international big man teammate. And just like the last one, Funaki is absolutely bossing it.

In fact the moustache isn’t all. The bro has had an absolute 70s cop show pimp glow-up while he’s been injured. Get a look at this fella...

It’s over, man. The league will never be the same. Expect him to average 10 points, 15 rebounds & 5 assists across the rest of the season with the best net rating in the NBA on his way to a championship, winning Finals MVP in the process. It’s the only feasible outcome after carrying that chain around for a month.

Speaking of being a good dude/teammate... it’s time for a few more stories on that topic. Ja Morant did some press duties during All Stars, as they all do, and in keeping with the laidback theme of the weekend (let’s be honest: nobody takes it seriously) he was asked a bunch of gimmicky questions amongst very few basketball ones. One of those questions was which teammate he’d pick to take with him if he were stranded on a deserted island. Hombre didn’t even hesitate with his answer.

Ja Morant: “Steven Adams. I feel like everybody knows that’s my bodyguard right there.”

Quite why he needs a bodyguard on a desert island is another thing. Maybe to protect him from snakes and wild pigs? S’pose he could also taste-test berries to figure out which ones are poisonous. Probably some manual labour to get the shelter built. To be honest, Steve-o would probably be right in his element there. Hunting wild pigs? He already does that as it is without being stranded on an island. The rest of it’s just a natural progression.

Memphis had another bloke representing the franchise at All Stars, a bloke who was there for the very first time: Jaren Jackson Jr. Great recognition for JJJ. However you could claim that the most significant thing that happened to him over the past week was being elected as a vice president for the NBA's Players’ Association.

CJ McCollum is President. Harrison Barnes is Secretary-Treasurer. Grant Williams has just been promoted to First VP. Then there are also six Vice President positions on the Executive Committee. Williams had previous held a VP role, now he’s been replacing Andre Iguodala at the expiration of that guy’s First VP term. Kyrie Irving is also no longer serving as a VP, thus opening up two new spots which Jaren Jackson and Donovan Mitchell have been voted into by their union peers. Each will serve a three-year term. They join Bismack Biyombo, Malcolm Brogdon, Jaylen Brown, and Garrett Temple as the other Vice Presidents on the committee.

And who, pray tell, was it that nominated Jaren Jackson Jr for this position? That would be none other than Steven Adams, friends. Lovely stuff. By the way, JJJ’s mother Terri Jackson is the Executive Director of the WNBPA so he’s got access to some pretty good advice. Tamika Tremaglio is the ED for the Men’s NBPA.

Plus here’s one more thing: it’s Steven Adams graciously offering to teach new recruit Luke Kennard the art of free throw shooting...

Yeah okay that one’s a joke.

The Shannon Sharpe Incident

It feels like so long ago that this happened, and the whole thing was completely cringe to begin with. But it hasn’t been mentioned in one of these yarns yet so better get it out of the way with. Los Angeles Lakers vs Memphis Grizzlies. Legendary NFL player turned wind-’em-up-and-let-’em-go sports talk shock jock Shannon Sharpe was sitting courtside and yapping away as though he was live on air with Skip Bayliss. Very soon the whole thing descended into chaos...

Steven Adams is usually the calm one in these affrays. The bodyguard as Ja Morant would say. Yet on this occasion he genuinely lost his cool and, you know what, he was absolutely justified in doing so. It’s ridiculous how courtside fans will try to insert themselves into the game as if buying an expensive ticket makes you part of the programme. It’s the same deal with streakers in this part of the world – nobody’s paying to see you, bro. Let alone that much of you. Streakers can admittedly be funny sometimes in an anarchic kinda way but as soon as you interrupt the sport you’re simply being a dickhead. Shannon Sharpe kept his immaculately crafted blue cardigan on, thankfully, but he was clearly being a dickhead. Steven Adams took righteous exception to that.

The funniest part was that right before Sharpe was inexplicably allowed back to his seat for the second half (presumably because he’s famous?) he offered a pull quote to ESPN’s Dave McMenamin in which he basically did the whole “Ja Morant doesn’t want the smoke, Dillon Brooks doesn’t want the smoke, Desmond Bane doesn’t want the smoke” yarn... very conspicuously leaving Steven Adams’ name off the list.

Anyway, the whole thing was a meme for a couple of days then Sharpe apologised for his part in the fracas and all has been forgotten. Presumably the Skip and Shannon show got a sneaky ratings boost though. Again, the whole thing was cringe. Shannon Sharpe is 54 years old and was arguing with blokes in their early 20s. Lame as hell... though at least he took responsibility for that later on. Fair play for that much.

Back To School

SLAM DUNKS

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