Rookie exceeding Heat’s expectation
Adebayo has impressed with maturity, intelligence.
MIAMI — It’s easy to forget that Bam Adebayo is just 20 years old.
At 6-foot-10 and 255 pounds, Adebayo looks and plays like a grown man. But spend a few minutes with him away from the basketball court, and he’ll show some signs of his age. Adebayo lives on the 48th floor of his downtown Miami condominium building. His mother, Marilyn Blount, lives on the fifth floor.
“She does mom things,” Adebayo said. “She’ll call me every now and then and be like, ‘You need me to wash your clothes?’ I’ll be like, ‘No.’ Then two weeks later I’ll be like, ‘Mom, can you wash my clothes?’”
But that — along with his driver’s license, birth certificate and passport – might be the only proof that Adebayo is 20.
The Heat’s rookie big man has impressed teammates and coaches with his maturity, ability to grasp NBA schemes and willingness to
fit into a very specific role. A role that’s been diminished since starting center Hassan Whiteside returned from injury, but one that’s still allowed Adebayo to flash his potential throughout the season.
Adebayo’s story began long before the Heat selected him with the 14th overall pick in last year’s draft, though. It began in a single-wide trailer home at 76 Church Lane in Little Washington, N.C., where Marilyn raised him as a single mother working as a cashier at the Acre Station Meat Farm.
“It pretty much comes from my mom,” Adebayo said when asked where his maturity comes from. “Because my mom was a real independent woman. Single parent living in a trailer and she made ends meet. When you see that every day for 18 years, it’s like if she can do it, I can do it.”
Marilyn and that single-wide trailer home became Adebayo’s motivation in life and his journey to the NBA.
“Bam knows that he had a hard road,” Marilyn said. “Bam looked at me going to work and how they used to treat me at work. Then Bam looked at me, and he would say, ‘Wow, Ma. I’m going to really work hard.’ I said, ‘Yes, Bam. Just get out there and do what you got to do.’”
Growing up with his mother in that trailer home shaped Adebayo. His father didn’t play an active role in his upbringing.
As early as Adebayo’s teenage years while playing for the Karolina Diamonds AAU program, he made it clear that helping his mother is the driving force behind any success he has playing basketball.
“His mom worked her butt off,” Adebayo’s AAU coach Kevin Graves said. “In America, there’s people that work their butts off and make a lot of money. And there’s people that work their butts off and don’t make a lot of money.
“For a mature kid like Bam, to watch his mom struggle and she never wavered. I think he developed that same mentality of you just work, man.”
That work ethic and aheadof-his-years mindset caught the Heat’s attention during the draft evaluation process. So did some other things: his athleticism, motor and willingness to be coached.
The Heat saw past Adebayo’s solid but not spectacular numbers as a Kentucky freshman, when he averaged 13.0 points, 8.0 rebounds and 1.5 blocks with fellow first-round picks De’Aaron Fox and Malik Monk scoring most of the points for the Wildcats.
“Bam didn’t have gaudy numbers, as far as scoring,” said Chet Kammerer, the Heat’s vice president of player personnel who leads the organization’s NBA draft scouting team. “But he was on a very talented team and the one thing that was true about him, he will do what you ask him to do. They wanted him to be the inside presence. He didn’t get a lot of touches. His job was defend, rebound, set screens for those guys and they were supposed to be the scorers.”
When Adebayo went through a pre-draft workout at AmericanAirlines Arena, the Heat realized he was better than his stats.
Kammerer remembers interviewing a humble, but confident Adebayo. In Adebayo’s talks with Heat brass, he claimed that he could hit 60 of 100 corner 3-pointers.
“I was thinking to myself, there is no way he’s going to make 60 threes,” Kammerer recalled. “I can’t remember how many threes he took in college. I said, there’s no way.”
Adebayo attempted zero 3-pointers in college. He made 60 during his predraft workout with the Heat.
“That was the one thing that shocked me,” Kammerer said.
Throw that in with Adebayo’s defensive ability, and the Heat left that workout sold.
“It solidified in my mind that this guy is better than I thought,” Kammerer said.
And Adebayo has continued to impress the Heat this season.
“His routine is as rock solid as anyone and as consistent as anyone and that has not wavered since Day 1 to now,” coach Erik Spoelstra said. “I remember in September, when we started really working with our young guys. We put together a program of an image of what a professional basketball player is playing for the Miami Heat, what that looks like, and a program to follow. And he’s followed it to the tee.”
Despite underwhelming numbers as a rookie (6.9 points, 5.6 rebounds and 1.5 assists), he’s exceeded expectations. Before the season, Spoelstra mentioned he was open to sending Adebayo to the G League for consistent playing time.
That hasn’t been necessary, with Adebayo playing in 67 games and averaging 19.9 minutes.
“My intention this season was just doing anything I could to get on the court,” Adebayo said. “We had some [injuries] and I got on the court, and I started performing and started producing. Coach started saying, ‘He’s undeniable.’ He trusted me at the end of fourth-quarter sets, running the offense through me a few games and after that we developed a bond. He trusts me just like I trust him.”
Adebayo’s most impressive quality has been his ability to switch on smaller player and keep them in front of him as a 6-foot-10 defender. Athleticism paired with a 7-foot-3 wingspan has allowed him to switch on All-Star perimeter players like Jimmy Butler, LeBron James and Stephen Curry … and stop them.
In the Heat-Warriors game on Dec. 3 in Miami, Curry spent 10 seconds trying to get past Adebayo with several crossovers and pump fakes before giving up and just passing the ball away late in the shot clock.
But Adebayo still has a lot of room for improvement on offense. Just 28 of his 169 made field goals this season have come from outside the restricted area, as he’s relied on dunks for most of his points.
Adebayo is shooting 11-of40 (27.5 percent) from outside the paint.
Those struggles were highlighted in a four-point, 1-of10 performance in a loss to the Trail Blazers on March 12. Portland center Jusuf Nurkic dominated the matchup with 27 points, 16 rebounds and three blocks.
“That was the worst game I’ve ever seen him play,” Graves said. “I taught him to play. I literally taught him how to shoot. What I’m telling you is this, that was the worst game I’ve ever seen him play in life – high school, AAU, pick-up game, anything.
“I texted him a picture of Nurkic [after the game]. First thing he saw when he walked out of the locker room was that dude.”
Graves points to another game as proof of Adebayo’s untapped potential. Adebayo scored 19 points on 7-of-7 shooting from the field and 5-of-5 shooting from the free-throw line in a loss to the Cavaliers on Nov. 28.
“That game showed who Bam could be down the road,” Graves said.
Even teammates have noticed Adebayo’s offensive potential behind the scenes.
“He’s a good offensive player, he just needs to get a little bit looser,” Goran Dragic said. “We see a lot of great touch from him in practice. He’s shown it. Sometimes the first year is always tough because you’re kind of adjusting to the game still from college to here. I think next year he’s going to be even better.”
But it’s important to remember that Adebayo is still a 20-year-old adjusting to the NBA game and NBA life.
“The sky is the limit for me,” he said. “I feel like I can do anything I put my mind to.”