25-under-25: Steven Adams at No. 14
The Step Back is rolling out its 25-under-25 list. Follow along with our rankings of the top 25 players under the age of 25.
For much of his life, Steven Adams has been an unknown. A native of New Zealand, he wasn’t reared in a prodigious cocoon like other international prospects, and though there were a few write-ups of Adams’ game floating around the Internet (DraftExpress, of course, had followed the 7-footer, the youngest of 18 children and sibling to Olympic greatness, since he was 16 years old), both the player and his game were mysterious when he came stateside to play one semester for Notre Dame Prep before enrolling at Pittsburgh for just a lone freshman season.
And yet, enough was known about Adams that when ND Prep came to Baruch College in the winter of 2012 to play in a high school tournament, Bill Murray was in attendance (that he may have been there in support of his son Luke, then an assistant at Xavier recruiting Myles Davis, Adams’ teammate, still doesn’t diminish the star potential — and intrigue — Adams possessed).
It’s a commonly held belief that post players mature at a slower clip than other prospects, and this was certainly true about Adams: “I think it’s because I just haven’t adapted to the American-style of basketball. I feel kind of foreign,” he said following the double-double he posted that snowy Saturday afternoon. Adams’ comfort level took some time to reach that of his NBA contemporaries, but now heading into his fifth year in the league — all spent with Oklahoma City — the 23 year old has transformed into an interior cornerstone, an up-and-coming big man perfectly suited for the brand of post play that has consumed the NBA.
Adams’ skillset is narrow — but that isn’t necessarily a detriment. When he turned pro, he was seen as an athletic big with a suspect back-to-the-basket game, but after several years of seasoning, his game, which is predicated on rim-running, patrolling the defense glass, and rolling through the paint, has thrived in an NBA where halfcourt spacing is de rigueur. Only one other Thunder player had a higher Box Plus-Minus than Adams (and that was MVP candidate Russell Wilson), and while the big’s offensive numbers appear to have slightly slipped from his 2016 levels, Adams had a banner year when given the opportunity to create: already a force on the offensive glass, he upped his 2-point makes per 36 minutes to 5.6 per game (according to Basketball-Reference.com), and became an incredibly efficient option in high pick-and-roll possessions (nearly three-quarters of his rolls originated from the perimeter, per Synergy Sports, and Adams scored 1.12 points per 100 possessions).
He also shined in transition, which is crucial for a team that used 98 possessions or so a game (ninth in the NBA): Adams scored 1.6 points per play, and according to Synergy, no other centers — including Rudy Gobert or DeAndre Jordan — posted as high a rate with as many fast-break attempts as Adams (88).
In the absence of Kevin Durant, the Thunder needed Adams to jump-start his offensive evolution, and he did that, showcasing his scoring bonafides and proving to be a competent option for Russell Westbrook, which is really all the team needed during a season in which Russ treated each game like a personal highlight reel and essentially made an 82-game-long Ball is Life mixtape. His defensive progress, though, is largely the reason why Adams ranks fourteenth on the Step Back’s top 25-under-25.
Adams posted a Defensive Plus-Minus of just above 1.5 in 2017, which ranked 24th stingiest among NBA’s centers. According to FiveThirtyEight’s CARMELO projections, his DPM projects to jump to more than two points next season where it should remain for the coming years. Why? An above average defensive rebounder who using his length and brute strength to shove pesky opponents away from securing additional caroms (five defensive rebounds per 36 minutes); when coupled with his defensive acumen — 1.2 blocks per 36 minutes — Adams has the makings of a all-NBA defensive first team selection. His closest comps, per FiveThirtyEight, included Rasheed Wallace, DeAndre Jordan, and Paul Millsap, each of whom helped redefine the possibilities of what a frontcourt player could accomplish in the league.
Next: 25-under-25 -- The best young players in the NBA
Adams averaged roughly 30 minutes per game, a sixteen percent increase from 2016, and his emergence was rushed in that the Thunder needed to develop its pieces to complement Westbrook. With a year of that much playing time under his belt, Adams has finally accustomed to the American-style of basketball that so bedeviled him as a teenager, and those defensive chops will only help propel Adams into one of the game’s outstanding talents.