Bam Adebayo, hero of the Heat: from a shack to the NBA Finals

• Heat.Sextas Finals

The picture shows a small green prefab house and a modest wooden porch at the entrance.

On the right you can see a basket dropped on the floor of that "forest in the middle of nowhere",

, where his mother raised him alone.

Photography has accompanied Bam Adebayo all the way to this point, the NBA Finals that from this week the Miami Heat will play against the Los Angeles Lakers.

"My biggest motivation was to get my mother out of there."

Adebayo had that image framed in his room at the university, a gift from a coach next to a small plate that served as a compass.

.

The shack has not yet been forgotten.

He has had it as a mobile wallpaper, in his locker room in the Heat locker room and has even had the address written on his sneakers.

And fate has not lost sight of him either: today he is one of the best centers in the NBA.

Although the temptation is there, his is not a story of poverty straight out of a Charles Dickens tale.

They went through hardships but not penalties because their mother deprived herself of everything.

And that has always been her motivation.

"She fought for me, and now I fight for her," he said at the

, one of the best 'quarries' in the United States.

Before coming to the NBA and finding a franchise made in her image in the Heat.

A pivot of the 21st century

The name comes from

.

One day, when he was barely a year old, he just overturned a table and since then no one has called him Edrice, his real name.

He has always had a huge body, but what is most striking is how he can move it.

How, in the words of his trainer, Erik Spoelstra, "he can be so big and athletic and explosive, how he can move his feet like that and be so light."

By physical conditions, Pat Riley compared him with the best Shawn Kemp, although by game he is radically different.

Nobody would have said it seeing his time at university: Kentucky always has so many resources (seven players from that team have reached the NBA, with varying success), that Bam Adebayo could not open his entire range and was limited to being a (very good) complement pivot: defend, block and continue hard to the basket.

Nothing to shoot in suspension, as happened to

, and even less to have too much time the ball in the hands.

His progression since arriving in Miami has been astonishing.

Traffic guard

During his first two years in Miami, Adebayo established himself as an

.

He confirmed that with those light feet and that lateral mobility he was the perfect pivot for this era in which they have to survive so often in defense away from the rim.

If he had stayed there, he would have already been assured of a long NBA career, but he would not be that player that

places alongside the great legends of a franchise famous for its professional demands - every Monday, they weigh the players and measure them the percentage of body fat.

Bringing your hands to your knees to take a break during a workout carries a $ 100 fine.

"He's a [Alonzo Mourning]. A [Udonis Haslem]. A [Dwyane Wade]. He's our standard bearer."

And if he had stayed there, Erik Spoelstra would not have been his coach.

From his hand, he has had the freedom to try, make mistakes and grow.

"He is exploring. The only way to improve is through experience. I want him to be a different player in six weeks. And in three months. And when he is, I will move the goal again," he said on ESPN.

Adebayo is not a typical directing center like

.

It takes much less time for the ball in your hands to command an attack as rich in movement as that of the Heat.

He's almost a guard rearranging traffic with his hand-to-hand deliveries and passes from the high post.

In three seasons he has gone from being a finisher, to a safety valve and since this year the focus of a finalist team in the NBA.

Key against LeBron and Davis

All without forgetting the role that led him to the NBA: Adebayo is also

, a mobile center as capable of protecting the paint as he is of changing brands with smaller players.

Adebayo, who is one of the best antidotes against Giannis Antetokounmpo, who left one of the playoff actions with the blockade of Jayson Tatum, is now key to stopping one of the most devastating duos, LeBron James and Anthony Davis.

Adebayo is one of the few centers who can boast the weapons to face Anthony Davis: he has enough strength to stand up to him in the paint and is mobile enough to keep an eye on him outside, be it on the perimeter or in continuations to the rim.

But his presence also reassures the bunch of forwards the Heat can put up with LeBron.

The

know that, when the time comes, Adebayo can also be paired with the Akron phenomenon.

It is the next step in a career that, given the progression of these three years, the freedom that Spoelstra has granted him, and the hunger that Adebayo still shows, there is still no ceiling.

"My ambition was born in that house. And anger. If we had had a better life, I would not be here. That 'trailer' made me who I am."

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