Bam Adebayo even managed to impress His Airness with his 83-point fever dream this week.
The Miami Heat big man Adebayo appeared Wednesday on ESPN’s “NBA Countdown” following his game-of-a-lifetime on Tuesday night against the Washington Wizards. Adebayo revealed during the interview that he received a text message from Michael Jordan congratulating him on his 83-point explosion.
“[He] just [said], ‘Congratulations,'” said Adebayo of Jordan. “Just short and sweet. If you know Mike, he’s not talking a lot.”
Adebayo, a three-time NBA All-Star at 28 years old, surpassed Kobe Bryant’s 81-point game in 2006 as the single highest scoring performance of the modern basketball era. In the all-time history of the NBA, now only Wilt Chamberlain’s 100-point game back in 1962 tops the 83 points that Adebayo erupted for this week.
As for Jordan, now 63 years old, his single-game career-high was “only” 69 points (set in 1990 with the Chicago Bulls during an overtime victory over the Cleveland Cavaliers). Jordan does however still hold the NBA’s single-game playoff scoring record of 63 points, set with the Bulls in 1986 during a double-OT loss to the Boston Celtics.
While Jordan was happy to show love to Adebayo after Adebayo’s historic game, the same cannot be said of some other retired NBA players. In particular, one retired former Kobe Bryant teammate went on a profane rant against Adebayo in response to the 83-point outing.
