Tyler Herro cleared to play vs. Hornets. And Goran Dragic, Avery Bradley ready to return
The Miami Heat received good news to begin the week.
Heat starting guard Tyler Herro will be available to play in Monday night’s game against the Charlotte Hornets at AmericanAirlines Arena. He was listed as questionable on Sunday’s injury report because of the NBA’s health and safety protocols, but was upgraded to available on Monday’s 5:30 p.m. injury report.
Herro, 21, was not with the team for practice on Sunday after a person he lives with recently tested positive for COVID-19.
“It’s crazy. We all know how crazy this time is going,” Herro said following Saturday night’s win over the Sacramento Kings. “Someone who lives with me tested positive before the game and I found out at halftime. I don’t know. Hopefully I don’t have to quarantine. It’s just crazy what’s going on.”
The fact that Herro has been cleared to play Monday indicates that either the housemate’s test result turned out to be a false-positive or Herro was not deemed a close contact by the NBA in the case that his housemate’s positive test was confirmed.
Herro finished Saturday’s victory with 15 points on 5-of-12 shooting, four rebounds and three assists in 40 minutes. He recorded 10 points on 4-of-8 shooting, two rebounds and one assist in 22 second-half minutes.
Herro is averaging 17.5 points on 45.5 percent shooting, 6.8 rebounds and 3.8 assists in 12 games this season. He missed seven games in January because of neck spasms.
Heat guards Avery Bradley (right knee contusion) and Goran Dragic (left groin strain) will also be available to play Monday. Bradley missed the past two games and Dragic, who will return to his sixth man role off the bench, missed the past three games.
Heat forward Andre Iguodala (neck spasms) and two-way contract guard Gabe Vincent (right knee soreness), who were both listed as probable, are also available against the Hornets.
The only Heat players out for Monday’s contest are Moe Harkless (left thigh contusion), Meyers Leonard (left shoulder strain) and Chris Silva (left hip flexor strain). Miami will have 14 players available against Charlotte.
As for Herro, had he been found to be a close contact to a positive case, precedent shows he likely would have been sidelined for about a week. Players who test positive for the virus usually have to miss at least about two weeks.
With Herro available for Monday’s game, the Heat avoided another COVID-19 issue after a month full of them.
The Heat has already been one of the teams most impacted by the NBA’s health and safety protocols, playing two games (Jan. 12 and Jan. 14 losses to the Philadelphia 76ers) with the NBA minimum of eight available players because of COVID-19 issues.
Already in Miami’s first 19 games of the season, health and safety protocols have forced Jimmy Butler to miss 10 games; Bradley to miss eight games, and Bam Adebayo, Dragic, Harkless, Udonis Haslem, Kendrick Nunn and KZ Okpala to miss two games. Bradley disclosed that he tested positive for COVID-19 in January.
In addition, the Heat’s Jan. 10 matchup against the Boston Celtics at TD Garden was postponed because of the NBA’s health and safety protocols. Miami did not have the NBA minimum of eight available players to proceed with the game due to an ongoing contact tracing investigation.
As a result of this lack of roster continuity, the Heat has used a league-leading 14 different starting lineups in 19 games this season. Miami has used a different starting group in each of its past six games.
But with Butler returning from his 10-game absence in Saturday’s win over the Kings, and Bradley, Dragic and Herro able to play Monday, the Heat’s roster is slowly becoming whole again.
This story was originally published February 1, 2021 at 5:35 PM.
