Bam Adebayo is getting WORSE offensively for Miami Heat | Hoops Tonight

Bam Adebayo is getting WORSE offensively for Miami Heat | Hoops Tonight

What’s up, guys? Thanks as always for supporting the show. It would mean a lot to me if you would take a second to scroll down and hit that subscribe button so you don’t miss any more of our videos. Also, make sure you follow us all over social media so you don’t miss any of our content or show announcements. Number 23, Bam Adabio, a guy who’s dropped from where he was last year in the top 20 for me. His season in review, he played in 78 games, averaged 18.1 points per game. That was his lowest since 2020. 9.6 rebounds per game, 4.3 assists per game, his highest since 2021. 2.0 stocks per game. His 1.3 steals per game last year was the second highest total of his career. Now, his efficiency is where things are going to get pretty interesting and I have a lot of different stuff I want to get into with Bam here. So, he was just 49% from the field last year. That was the lowest mark of his career to this point. Now, part of it was the increase in his three-point volume. People are going to shoot lower percentages on threes. That’s going to affect your field goal percentage. He had never taken more than one three-point attempt per game in the first uh several seasons of his career. Last year was the first year that he attempted over one. He attempted almost three threes per game. So, that obviously plays a certain role in the drop in his field goal percentage. But, he also shot poorly on twos. He shot 52% on twos, which is his lowest mark since his rookie season. He’s had three straight years from 2020 to 2022 in the past where he averaged the same points per game, 18 points per game, but shot 57% on twos over the course of those three seasons. So substantially lower this year than levels he’s reached previously in his career. He’s flatout regressing as a shot maker inside the ark. He shot below 40% on floaters and hooks last year, which is brutal for his position at the center position. When you do so much work rolling out of ball screens, your ability to short range shot make, either beating switches with quick quick hook shots or catching on the roll and spinning into a quick hook or making floaters on the roll, those are vitally important parts of shot making at the center position and he was below 40% on them last year. He used to just be better at it. He’s 52% on floaters and hooks in 2021, 55% on floaters and hooks in 2022. So, for whatever reason, and I don’t I really don’t have an explanation for it. I he just hasn’t been able to recreate what he did in years past and elevate from there to that next level. It kind of came to the surface, if you guys remember, as an issue for Bam during the 2023 finals in the series against Denver. He was consistently getting quality short- range looks, layups a little bit further away from the rim, short hooks, floaters, little bank shots. He was getting all of these looks and he just wasn’t making them against Denver and it was becoming a problem because they were the kind of shots that were open in their offense often. His touch, it’s not just on hooks and floaters either. On layups, it’s been an issue. He shot just 50% last year on layups. That’s way below where his peers are at the center position. Again, Bam 50%. Anthony Davis 60%. Carl Anthony Towns 58%. Ivita Zubots 57%. Nicola Joic 67%. You guys get the point. compared to his peers, he really struggles on short range shot making, layups, hooks, floaters, that sort of thing. And that has ended up being an issue for him as he’s failed to kind of take that next step as an offensive player. There was kind of like this inflection point for Ban in right around that 2022 2023 phase when the Heat made those back-to-back conference finals runs in their NBA Finals run where it kind of felt like he was either going to improve as a finisher and become like one of those legit second tier stars like Anthony Davis or he was going to plateau and instead he’s kind of regressed. This is actually crazy even with the influx of his three-point shooting which is legitimate. like he had never attempted more than one three per game. He attempted almost three three points uh three-pointers per game this year and he made 36% of them which is very respectable as a three-point shooter. But even with that influx of like a more efficient shot profile, he posted a true shooting percentage of just 56% last year, which was the lowest mark of his entire career. This is a big part of how he slipped out of the top 20 for me despite the fact that Tyresese Hallebertton, Damen Lillard, and Jason Tatum have dropped out of the list entirely, which should in theory have bolstered him against that, but I dropped him because he’s just regressing as an offensive player. And it’s preventing the Heat from getting to their ultimate goals in the postseason. The lack of shotmaking for Bam is especially frustrating because of how amazing he is at everything else. including passing out of the center position. When it comes to that part of offense, being that five out dribble handoff fulcrum, going side to side, making reads at a twoman game, being the guy that ties everything together for that offense, he’s actually great at that. There are only four centers in the entire NBA who meet the following criteria. At least 25 minutes per game, so a guy who plays a lot. A usage rate of at least 20%, so a guy who has the ball a lot. and an assist to turnover ratio of at least 2 to1. There’s four guys in the entire NBA at the center position that meet those criteria. And the other three guys are not very athletic. Demanis Sabonis, Nicola Vousvich, those guys are right around 2 to1. And then Joic who’s better than 3 to one, who obviously is kind of the anomaly, but those are like skillfocused centers who are great playmakers. And then it’s Bam. Bam is the fourth guy on that list. Another way to put it is like this. Bam is the only truly athletic center in the NBA who can playmake at that elite uh like at that elite level of efficiency and volume where he’s not turning the ball over. He’s top five in assists per game among centers. He’s the only guy who brings that athleticism and that like refined playmaking at that center position in the entire league. You combine that with his unbelievable defensive versatility, which we’re about to get more into in a minute, and you have a player that had a truly skyhigh potential, like top tier superstar potential if he could have just added reliable shotmaking. That’s why I’ve been so keyed in on that piece of his game over the last few years. And it just kind of feels like a missed opportunity. He’s regressing when it should be something that he’s improving on. But again, he’s an excellent playmaker. He’s fifth in assists per game among centers overall. We talked about that modern dribble handoff fulcrum in the NBA. Like when you have guys that can score and pass out of action guards. Having a big who can flow from side to side meaning like run that first action. Oh, it doesn’t work. Quick, make yourself available at the top of the key, catch, turn, and go to the other side of the floor, dribble handoff, while always being able to make the reads out of it. Like, oh, they’re overplaying me. I’m going to fake the dribble handoff and go to the rim. Or setting the good screens that free the guys up, passing to guards as they back cut. or if they get top locked and are forced to back cut the playmaking that you do out of that. There’s all of this stuff that in terms of decision-m and playmaking you need from the center position in order to run five out offense in the modern NBA. An offense that the Heat run uh uh more than many teams in the NBA. Bam’s great at that. And then again, the defensive end of the floor is where Bam really se separates himself. Bam didn’t have his best defensive season last year. his 0.7 blocks per game were the lowest since his rookie uh since his rookie year in the NBA. Now, context there, he’s playing with more two big looks. That’s going to put him in some different situations playing alongside KL Wear. And I generally think it was the least motivated he’s been as a defender since he came into the league as the Heat were just so far away from achieving their postseason goals. He finished outside of the top five in defensive player of the year voting for the first time since 2019 last year. I do still believe in BAM as an apex defender in this league. I think that he will continue to operate closer to that top five defensive player of the year type of caliber player looking forward in his career. I look at last year as more of like an outlier. The big differentiator for Ban is that he’s essentially a hybrid between a traditional rim protecting big and kind of like a legitimate wing in terms of his ability to move his feet on the perimeter. He brings the best scheme versatility defensively out of any center in the league aside from maybe Victor Wmanyama. I think he’s the best switching center in the league. Bam. There was a time when I thought it was Anthony Davis and you could argue AD is still maybe a better defender all around because of how good he is at the rim, but AD put on a bunch of weight and hasn’t been able to move his feet on the perimeter as well. Hasn’t been as good defending switches. Bam is legitimately awesome switching out onto the perimeter. One of the unique things he does that many other bigs struggle with, we’re going to talk about this when we get to Evan Mobley, but one of the things that like Evan Mobley struggles with is when he gets switched on to quicker guards, he gives too much space. And those guys get really comfortable with their pull-up three-point shooting. Evan got lit on fire on pull-up threes and isos this year. It kind of prevented him from being as good of an ISO big as he as he could have been, as as good of a a switching big as he could have been. Bam. You’ll see him like 2 feet outside the three-point line picking up pull-up shooters way out on the perimeter. He’s way more active with his hands to disrupt the rhythm and flow of pull-up shooters so they can’t comfortably settle into pull-up jump shots while also having the speed laterally and the recovery athleticism to deal with quickness getting past him. He’s unbelievable defending on switches. Even last year in what everyone considers to be a down year, he was still amazing on the perimeter and switches. Statistically, there were 151 players in the NBA last year who defended at least 50 ISOs. Bam allowed just 0.62 points per possession in ISO. That ranked third on that list. Third out of 151 players. He does this while also being very good in traditional coverages. He gets up to the level of screens quickly and at the level coverages and can disrupt pull-up shooters. He can contest in the mid-range. He can protect the rim. He obviously isn’t as good protecting the rim as some of like the taller, longer centers in the NBA, but he’s good enough at it in conjunction with being one of those truly elite top tier switching defenders that he makes life very easy for Eric Spolstra schematically because they can build out any defensive scheme that they want. Bam can do literally anything you ask him to do. One of the most versatile defensive foundations in the game. Bam can be a frustrating player and his lack of developing upside has certainly prevented Miami from reaching their ultimate goals. And his regression there is like, like I said, downright frustrating, especially if you’re a fan of of Bam and the Heat. But you can’t do a whole lot better in the modern NBA than a big man who can legitimately anchor any defensive coverage at a defensive player of the year level, giving you an enormous amount of flexibility from opponent to opponent both in the regular season and in the playoffs while also being a legitimately good dribble handoff fulcrum on offense that can kind of get guys set up and in the right spot. Now, his his lack of touch, especially around the rim, prevents him from reaching that second tier of superstars in the NBA, but his overall value is still enough to put him at 23 on this year’s list.

Jason breaks down the strengths and weaknesses of Miami Heat center Bam Adebayo, including his impressive defensive versatility and his struggles to score efficiently, dropping him to 23rd on his NBA ranking list.

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