The usual elements were in place for something statistically outlandish to happen on Saturday night, March 16th, 2013: An NBA game with little-to-no discernible historic purpose shaded over by an eye-catching stat line from Seattle’s favorite Republican NBA player: Spencer Hawes:
The game: Central Division-leading Indiana Pacers at the Andrew Bynum-less Philadelphia 76ers
The history: Hawes becomes just the sixth player since the 1985-86 season to accomplish the 18 x 16 x 8 x 7 line:
As is often the case with these abnormal stat lines, the company Hawes just joined is about as decorated as you can get. Every other player on the list has won the MVP award and there are a total of 11 NBA championships between them. The games listed above are games for the ages; the numbers pop off the page and while they’re random in every sense of the word, each time this particular line has occurred, it’s resulted in a win.
Beyond honoring Hawes for his performance on Saturday night I want to acknowledge a couple of things about Charles Barkley. For starters, he’s the only guy on the list under 6’11”. Barkley blocked seven shots in a game? And in the same game he wrecked the 86-87 Trail Blazers for 31pts, 21rebs and 9asts? I shake my head at numbers like this. If it happened today, we’d be discourteously shoving each other out of the way to anoint his game as one of the best of all time. To add a little more to the bizarro element of Barkley’s performance: He didn’t even start.
As much as I want to dive deeper into the on-court life of Charles Barkley, the emphasis is on the magnificence of Spencer Hawes on this strange spring night in 2013.
Dancing With Noah 