Rockets’ Steven Adams clears up diet misconceptions. It’s not full carnivore, but it’s impressive.

On the basketball court, Steven Adams is known for his overpowering style of play and for being an absolute monster on the offensive glass. Off the court, his diet has become a thing of legend with former teammates constantly telling incredible stories about what they witnessed the New Zealander eat in his 13 years in the NBA.

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Most of the wild tales come from Adams’ two years with the Memphis Grizzlies when the 6-foot-11, 265-pound center was on a strict carnivore diet, eating nothing but animal products.

Adams, who is in his third season with the Houston Rockets, appeared with teammate Reed Sheppard on Thursday’s episode of The Old Man and the Three podcast and explained his diet himself.

First off, even though Rockets point guard Fred VanVleet once called him “a real-life caveman”, Adams – who averages 8.6 rebounds, including 4.5 offensive, in just 21.3 minutes per game – is no longer a strict carnivore, but he talked about making the change when he moved to Memphis after playing his first seven seasons in the league in Oklahoma City. Adams said early in his career, he had a dietitian that had him eating all the food groups, but then he got bored of it.

“So, I just went straight fricking steaks, red meat, sometimes liver as well,” Adams said. “That was while I was in Memphis, and bro, it was like the most amazing change, like mentally and everything. I was like, dude, why haven’t I been doing this earlier?”

Adams has since altered the diet to add more fruit, especially on gamedays, but his daily breakfast consists of a pound of ground beef mixed together with six eggs. It’s something his teammates are well aware of because he cracks open the container of food at shootaround every morning, and the smell? Well, Sheppard explained.

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“It’s been sitting in a heater for like an hour waiting on him,” Sheppard said. “So, he waits until we get in a tiny room watching film and it’s literally as soon as everyone gets in there, door gets closed and then he opens it and then you just have to smell the meat and the eggs for like 30 minutes.”

“It’s like tear gas, bro,” said Adams, while mimicking opening the container in front of his teammates. “They all look right in the back corner.”

“We know exactly what it is,” Sheppard said. “It’s gross.”

On gamedays, that breakfast will hold over Adams so that he doesn’t have a full lunch, just eating fruit before the game, but then after the game he gets steak, 2 ½ ribeyes to be exact, and he eats it like a true carnivore.

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“No utensils,” Sheppard said. “Just straight hands.”

Of course, Adams has his reasons.

“In my defense, just saying, when you’re eating steak, you will not burn your tongue ever if you eat with your hands,” Adams said. “You know that’s a good idea.”

Sheppard also says he’s run into Adams at restaurants on the road and it will be his teammate’s second or third dinner of the night. Adams explained that he will get full from the steaks, but his stomach resets if he get a different kind of food in front of him, so he starts again.

“It’s kind of weird, mentally I get full of one cuisine that’s why I try and mix it around,” Adams said. “If I just have steak, I can do that, but I’ll get to a point where I’m like alright (I’m full). But then if I go to a Vietnamese (restaurant), I can crush that again too, so it starts back up. It just resets for some reason. So, that’s how I can just go around, because it has to be different. I can’t just go steakhouse to steakhouse.”

This article originally published at Rockets’ Steven Adams clears up diet misconceptions. It’s not full carnivore, but it’s impressive..