Steven Adams of the Oklahoma City Thunder is now the team’s longest-tenured player after the trade of Russell Westbrook to the Houston Rockets this offseason.
The Thunder have gotten off to an expectedly bad start without Brodie, but Adams continues to put forth his usual effort on the boards and on the defensive end, but he has been suffering from a knee injury. Ahead of the Thunder’s Saturday afternoon game against the New Orleans Pelicans, Adams has been ruled out, according to Royce Young of ESPN:
Steven Adams (knee contusion) is out today against the Pelicans.
— Royce Young (@royceyoung) November 2, 2019
Through 4 games, the loss of Westbrook is contributed to a big-time increase in rebounds for Adams, who is averaging a career-high 11.8 rebounds per game on another career-high 28.8 percent defensive rebound rate.
Last year, Adams was a total workhorse for the Coach Billy Donovan and the Thunder: The New Zealand native played 33.4 minutes a game in 80 contests, leading to a career-high 2669 total minutes played.
Adams put forth myriad career-highs last season, including in points per game (13.9), rebounds per game (9.5), assists per game (1.6) and steals per game. Despite being a major part of OKC’s culture (seemingly) forever, Adams is only 26 years old in his 7th season in the NBA, which means a team looking to add veteran help while also hewing close to a youth-oriented timeline might aim to trade for Adams before the trade deadline in the 2019-20 season.
Of course, Adams will have to stay healthy for that to be the case, but he has never had a history of injuries – with 70 games played being his career-low in the 2014-15 season.
Follow Us
Subscribe