Miami Heat center Bam Adebayo lit the NBA world on fire on Tuesday night, scoring 83 points (20-43 FG, 7-22 3PT, 36-43 FT) against the Washington Wizards to set the new second-highest individual game points tally in NBA history. Adebayo only trails Wilt Chamberlain’s iconic 100-point game, while sailing past the iconic Kobe Bryant’s 81-point game from 2006.
Even though Adebayo had one of the greatest nights in NBA history, his performance has been polarizing. While everybody acknowledges that getting 83 points in an NBA game is an incredible achievement, the way Adebayo got his hasn’t rubbed people the right way. His NBA record 43 free throw attempts and blatant stat-padding to chase the record down while the Heat had a 20-point fourth quarter lead have hurt how the performance is being perceived by fans and NBA players.
Former NBA All-Star Gordon Hayward spoke to Fadeaway World about Adebayo’s history-making performance, giving the Heat center the props he deserves while also pointing out how a performance like this from a defense-first center sends the wrong message about the NBA.
Ishaan Bhattacharya: “Did you watch Bam Adebayo’s 83-point game?”
Gordon Hayward: “I didn’t watch the game. I actually saw about, heard about, and read all about it the next morning. It was obviously a crazy performance. And, you know, one that’s gonna go down in the record books, I guess.”
Ishaan Bhattacharya: “Do you have thoughts on how the performance went down? Do you think the magnitude of the free throws should take anything away from the performance itself?”
Gordon Hayward: “I mean, it’s hard because I love Bam as a player. I think he’s one of the best players, best two-way centers in the league. But he’s not a scorer. And so for him to score 83 points, 43 free throws, and the other thing ism he’s not like a super high volume free throw guy. So it just, I think it kind of hurts the credibility of the league.”
“I grew up, you know, watching Kobe Bryant and as did, I think, a lot of people, and kind of like idolizing Kobe. For him to pass Kobe, not being a scorer, I just don’t see that as being great for the NBA. I think it’s already struggling with some perception of the game being like a pickup game, and, you know, it being just so loose and fast-paced, it makes it feel like it’s just an open gym. And I think when somebody scores, you know, 83 points, that’s not really a scorer like that. It almost emphasizes how much of a pickup game it is, you know?”
“So, that being said, I don’t know if you can’t take it away. It’s, he did score 83 points, and you can never take that away from him. There have been other games with high scoring numbers where people did similar things. And I think I read, you know, that when Wilt scored a hundred, that they were intentionally fouling and doing some stuff like that too. So it’s, you know, it is what it is.”
Gordon Hayward on Bam Adebayo’s 83-point game
“I love Bam as a player. I think he’s one of the best two-way centers in the league. But he’s not a scorer. For him to score 83 points, 43 free throws, and he’s not a high volume free throw guy. So, I think it kind of hurts the… pic.twitter.com/iZb89AIc0p
— Ishaan Bhattacharya (@IshaanBhatta) March 12, 2026
Hayward’s critique is one that’s being echoed by many across the basketball world. Adebayo is one of the best bigs of his generation, but it is odd to say that the center who should arguably have already won a Defensive Player of the Year award is now the second-highest individual game scorer in NBA history.
Many are upset specifically about Bam Adebayo using garbage time to chase down Bryant’s iconic 81-point game, a game that’s become even more precious to his fans since his untimely passing. To see a performance like Adebayo’s breaking Kobe’s nearly 20-year-old achievement in the manner it happened has made it a harder pill to swallow.
Bam Adebayo is averaging 20.0 points and 9.8 rebounds on the season, with averages of 16.1 points and 8.9 rebounds for his whole career. This means he had a +63.0 differential on his season scoring average and a +67.9 differential on his career scoring average. This shows a stark improvement that cannot be compared to any other NBA player in the past. The same applies to his free throws, as he’s averaging 5.5 free throw attempts per game over the season, and 4.7 per game over his career.
Hayward was a score-first forward in his NBA career, averaging 15.2 points, 4.4 rebounds, and 3.5 assists over 14 NBA seasons. His career-high of 44 points (15-25 FG, 4-9 3P, 10-12 FT) came in 2021 against the Atlanta Hawks while he was a member of the Charlotte Hornets.
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