Bam Adebayo's historic 83 point night was awesome

83 points, 9 rebounds, 3 assists, 2 steals and 2 blocks on 20/43 from the field, 7/22 from three and 36/43 from the foul line. That was Bam Adebayo’s stat line in the Heat’s 150-129 win over the Wizards on Tuesday night. He surpassed Kobe Bryant for the 2nd highest scoring game in NBA history. Did he take a lot of free throws to get there? Sure but that doesn’t take away from what a historic and awesome night it was for Adebayo.

A lot of people have a lot of takes from this game so let’s go through them. One of the takes I have seen is that Adebayo took too many free throws and this wasn’t ‘ethical.’ Yes, 36/43 from the line is ridiculous and yes Washington is tanking to an extreme level but he still got the 2nd highest scoring game in NBA history. That is really cool, it was a remember where you were kind of night. 31 points in the 1st quarter, 12 in the 2nd, 19 in the 3rd and 21 in the 4th, gets you to 83 points. It was the 1st quarter where Bam was most dominant, 31 points, 3 rebounds and 1 steal and block on 10/16 from the field is a very good game and among the most dominant single quarter performances in NBA history. He was getting to his spot and the shots were going in. As the quarter went on, the Wizards were not able to figure out a way to stop him. As the game went on Washington’s strategy became to triple team Bam and then if that did not work, foul him. So yes, there were a lot of free throws but Wilt Chamberlain was 28/32 from the line in his 100 point game. How Adebayo got to 83 was very similar to how Wilt got to 100.

Next, we have to stop with that take that Bam should have stopped at 81 to honor Kobe. Which, there are some layers to Kobe Bryant that we probably should not be honoring but we don’t need to get into right now. The Wizards play-by-play announcer Chris Miller thought that the Heat were pulling Adebayo from the game when he tied Kobe at 81 and the Heat committed an intentional foul. "And out of respect Erik Spoelstra will pull Bam Adebayo,” Miller said. That is not what happened and it should not have been what happened. Sam Amick of The Athletic wrote that same sentiment saying “realizing that there was more meaning in matching Bryant’s mark and sharing that unique spotlight as a tacit tribute than there was in pushing for more.” Bam and Heat coach Erik Spoelstra would have become cult heroes among Kobe fans but standing alone in 2nd place for all-time scoring in an NBA game is really cool and meaningful and stopping to honor someone because of his cult following is not something that should have happened.

It is also really funny that it was Bam Adebayo who scored 83 points because, as Bill Simmons said, if you were to have drafted who in the league would surpass Bryant’s 81 points before the season, Bam might not have gone in the top 50. If you were drafting just Heat players, he probably would have gone 3rd behind Tyler Herro and Norman Powell. Bam isn’t a big time scorer, entering Tuesday’s game, he averaged 18.9 points per game and is at 20.0 points per game after it. He isn’t a big time scoring center like Wilt was, that is what makes this feat so surprising.

Bam Adebayo scoring 83 points in a single game is objectively cool. Yes, the Wizards are awful, yes, he shot a lot of free throws and yes, there was stat padding involved but most of these high scoring games include a level of stat padding. That doesn’t change that March 10, 2026 is an historical night in NBA history and one that will be remembered. Being in 2nd place in the NBA single game scoring record is cool and I hope one day we get to see someone pass Wilt for first all time.