As the fourth quarter in Oklahoma went on, the telly cameras made a point of focussing in on Steven Adams a few times as the Big Kiwi sat quietly on the bench. Towel draped over his lap, rising to applaud his mates a few times but to be fair there wasn’t often a lot to applaud.
Playoff Steve turned up, that much was true. With the Blazers copping a massive blow to their chances in the playoffs a few weeks back when Jusuf Nurkic was hurt, that meant a Stache Bros reunion as starting centres opposing each other in the playoffs
When Sean Marks left the warm and nurturing bosom of the San Antonio Spurs, there was talk. Of course an NBA GM’s gig is one that would be almost impossible to turn down. But not every GM’s gig is like the rest and the job he inherited at the Nets provided a team left reeling from one of the worst trades the NBA has ever seen.
Ask anyone at UVA and they’ll absolutely rave about Jack Salt. Sometimes he’d have a prominent role in games - setting screens, guarding the rim, and grabbing rebounds – other times he’d only play a few minutes.
Keep it quiet, don’t want get ahead of ourselves here or anything… but the last few games have seen a big boost in the statties for a certain Steven Adams. The Thunder overall… not as much… but let’s bookmark that one for now.
Last time it was a full on look at how Steven Adams has been tracking against the criticism that’s come back his way in recent times. Mostly from frustrated fans, to be fair. This time it’s all about why those fans are frustrated. Because you may recall a moment in history not completely forgotten in which the Thunder were hanging in there for the third seed in the west.
All them trips throughout Asia and back as the Tall Blacks sought qualification for the 2019 FIBA World Cup came to their conclusion in late February with a dramatic 69-67 win away in Jordan followed by a bit of a disappointing 86-80 defeat in Jordan.
There’s like, seven games to catch up on this week because of the post-All Star smashing out of the schedule so thinking we may do something a little different here. Rather than the all-in recaps of each individual game, this week’s gonna be more of an overall look at the state of things.
All Stars concluded. Nicely rested and relaxed after a week’s break. Good to go all over again.
The initial feeling was pretty strong about this Breakers side. They’d reshaped the roster to play fast and aggressive and the pedigree of their imports, so often the factor that turns a good team into a great team in this league, was as high as its been for years, not to mention bringing back Corey Webster.
The fact right now is that Steven Adams is playing a supporting role to The Paul George and Russell Westbrook Show these days. The Great Funaki made a decent attempt at cracking the All Stars this season, but he didn’t quite get there while the other two were almost automatics.
There’s never been an NBA trade deadline quite like that one, that’s for sure. So dense and crazy that it’s taken a week for all the dust to settle and we’re still not quite there yet with the whole buyout season now on the cards.
There was good news before tip-off, with that old pesky ankle injury not about to stop Kiwi Steve from getting to work against the Miami Heat. Certainly didn’t look like it was holding him back much when he rose all the way up for a little bit of this on the first possession of the game…
This is not the Super Bowl that the people demanded. Saints against Chiefs would have had everything this matchup has but with a smile on top. Instead we’ve got the evil twin matchup of that which is the Los Angeles Rams against the New England Patriots.
They laughed when he made a mess of his eurostep. He laughed too, to be fair. Everybody laughed. It was very funny, dude stepped all over the place like he was on the dancefloor not the hardwood.
1,779,073 votes was good for sixth on the standings, trailing LeBron James, Luka Doncic, Kevin Durant, Paul George and Anthony Davis. Ahead of Nikola Jokic, Kyle Kuzma, Draymond Green and DeMarcus Cousins (people vote for Lakers and Warriors regardless of if they’re playing or not). That’s pretty bloody amazing, to be honest.
It’s been a strange old season for the Breakers, at times they’ve looked magical and at others they’ve looked atrocious and at all times they’ve looked inconsistent. A bit like the NBL as a whole, really.
It’s been a couple weeks since the last Kiwi Steve update, a couple weeks too many to go through with all them game recaps or whatever. So instead, to catch up on what’s been missed, we’re going to do things a little different this time by focussing on a few of them bigger picture happenings instead.
The commanding dunks are just the icing on the cake. He’s got a bit of range to his shooting as well, making three triples against Perth last game. There’s the rebounding which is utterly essential from him in this team, which has prioritised speed over size and therefore needs a proper old bully going up to get those loose ones like Shawn Long can do.
All Star voting is officially open as of Christmastime and it is your civic and patriotic duty as a New Zealander to submit those cheeky ballots for Steven Adams as often as humanly possible… which is once per day (per email addy) across three different avenues.