Five questions facing the Heat entering the restart. One, what will the rotation look like?
After more than four months since the season was suspended amid the COVID-19 pandemic, the Miami Heat is on the verge of actually playing in a game.
It’s just a scrimmage, as the Heat (41-24) opens its three-game scrimmage schedule Wednesday night against the Sacramento Kings at the ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex in Walt Disney World. But it will mark the first time the Heat has faced an opponent since a March 11 loss to the Charlotte Hornets.
Miami’s eight-game “seeding” schedule begins Aug. 1 against the Denver Nuggets.
Before the game action begins, here’s a look at five important questions facing the Heat as it prepares for the resumption of the season at Lake Buena Vista ...
1. What will the Heat’s rotation be if the full roster is available?
While only 15 of the Heat’s 17 players are currently with the team in the NBA bubble — center Bam Adebayo and guard Kendrick Nunn remain in Miami — the full 17-man roster is expected to be available at some point. This will put some tough rotation decisions in front of coach Erik Spoelstra, who has said in the past these are the challenging decisions he wants to make if it means the full roster is healthy and available.
With center Meyers Leonard and rookie guard Tyler Herro back from injury following the four-month hiatus, the Heat’s rotation will look different than when the season was suspended in March.
Players probably won’t be immediately ready to log their normal allotment of minutes when the season resumes, so let’s assume Miami uses a 10-man rotation during the eight “seeding” games. Who will those 10 be?
Before Leonard was forced to miss time, the Heat’s starting lineup of Nunn, Jimmy Butler, Duncan Robinson, Adebayo and Leonard was a plus-121. That’s, by far, the best plus/minus for any five-man Heat group this season, with the second-best lineup at plus-60.
Let’s assume the Heat goes with that starting five because the combination was so effective before Leonard’s injury. With Nunn, Butler, Robinson, Adebayo and Leonard starting in this scenario, who will be the five off the bench?
Goran Dragic, Herro, Derrick Jones Jr., Jae Crowder and Andre Iguodala make sense, with Kelly Olynyk as the 11th man who plays in some games depending on matchups or whether Spoelstra feels the need to extend the rotation. That leaves Udonis Haslem, KZ Okpala, Chris Silva, Solomon Hill, Gabe Vincent and Kyle Alexander as the six players outside of Miami’s rotation in most games.
“I don’t know if there has ever been more of a need to have depth and have players on your roster that you feel comfortable playing in a game than right now,” Spoelstra said, referring to the uncertainty surrounding daily COVID-19 tests and potential injuries following the long layoff. “What that will exactly mean for our rotation, I don’t know, but I’m open to it. I just know we’ll play if not all of the guys, it will be pretty dang close to it.”
2. What will “playoff Jimmy” look like?
“Regular-season Jimmy” has been very solid. He’s averaging team highs in points (20.2), assists (6.1) and steals (1.7) in his first season with Miami. But those around the Heat have been looking forward to meeting “playoff Jimmy.”
Butler, 30, has averaged 17.3 points while shooting 43.6 percent from the field and 35 percent on threes, 5.5 rebounds, 3.4 assists and 1.5 steals in 55 playoff games during his NBA career.
But Butler has been even better than that in recent seasons, as he has averaged 20.7 points on 44.2 percent shooting from the field and 34.4 percent shooting on threes, 6.1 rebounds, 4.2 assists and 1.7 steals in his past 35 playoff games dating to the 2014-15 season. During this span, he has also posted an impressive plus/minus of plus-98.
One thing that would lift Butler’s game to the next level in the playoffs? Make three-pointers at a more efficient rate. He’s shooting just 24.8 percent on threes this season, which would go down as his worst three-point-shooting season since making 18.2 percent of his threes as a rookie in 2011-12.
There’s no doubt the Heat will rely heavily on Butler when the playoffs begin.
3. Can the Heat’s offense pick up where it left off?
The Heat has featured a top-10 offense this season, as it enters the restart with the league’s seventh-best offensive rating (scoring 112.2 points per 100 possessions). It’s the most efficient offensive rating Miami has posted since the NBA began recording the stat in the 1996-97 season.
Other numbers that are representative of the Heat’s offensive explosion: Miami owns the NBA’s ninth-best team shooting percentage (47), top three-point shooting percentage (38.3) and 13th-best free-throw shooting percentage (77.8) while assisting on the third-highest percentage of made shots in the NBA at 65.6 percent.
The Heat was below average in almost every offensive category last season: 22nd in shooting percentage (45), 21st in three-point shooting percentage (34.9), 30th in free-throw percentage (69.5) and 26th in offensive rating (106.7 points per 100 possessions).
This drastic offensive improvement has been a big part of the Heat’s success. It’s important that Miami doesn’t take a step back on this end of the court even after the extended break because the defense has not been as reliable.
4. What will the Heat’s defense look like when the season restarts, and is it a reason to be concerned?
The good news for Miami is its defense hasn’t been terrible this season. However, the defense hasn’t been great either.
The Heat’s defense has been statistically mediocre during the 65 games it played before the season was suspended. Miami has posted the league’s 14th-best defensive rating (allowing 109.2 points per 100 possessions) this season, and owns the 13th-best defensive rating of the 22 teams participating in the restart.
Getting Leonard back from injury should help, with the Heat allowing 105.5 points per 100 possessions with the big man on the court compared to 109.6 points per 100 possessions when he’s not on the court. And it’s hard to judge just how good this team can be on defense with Crowder and Iguodala in the rotation since they have played just 13 and 14 games with the Heat, respectively, since the February trade.
The Heat, which has finished with a top-10 defense in each of the past four seasons, can’t just rely on its offense to win games in the playoffs because it’s a formula that has not proven to be effective in the past. The defense must be better than mediocre when the season resumes.
“The most important word, make no mistake about it, is consistency on that end of the floor,” Leonard said of the Heat’s defense. “It has to be between both units, it has to be between whichever players are on the floor if it’s mixed and matched. We have players that check every box. You want shooting? We got it. You need an on-ball defender? You got it. You need somebody who can roam off the ball and make plays? We got it. Again, I think consistency is a big, big key for us.”
5. Which Heat team will show up when games resume — the one that was 27-5 at home or the one that was 14-19 on the road?
Disney will serve as a neutral site for teams, so that could be seen as an advantage for a team that struggled to win on the road. But it could also be seen as a disadvantage for a team that was so dominant at home.
“Do we have home-court or do we not?” Spoelstra asked with a smile. “We’re in Florida. Maybe I’ll just tell our guys that we’re playing at home every day.”
This story was originally published July 20, 2020 at 12:02 PM.
