Exploring the Heat’s Adebayo-Dedmon pairing and if it’s a sustainable solution vs. Bucks
After losing the first two games of its first-round playoff series, the Miami Heat is in search of solutions. Could a Bam Adebayo and Dewayne Dedmon frontcourt pairing be one?
That remains to be seen, but it seems like Heat coach Erik Spoelstra is willing to at least explore the combination. In the middle of the Heat’s 34-point blowout loss to the Milwaukee Bucks in Game 2 at Fiserv Forum on Monday, Spoelstra played Adebayo and Dedmon together for extended minutes for the first time since they became teammates last month.
Adebayo and Dedmon, the two centers in the Heat’s rotation, shared the court for eight minutes in Game 2. The tandem played less than a minute together in the regular season, as Dedmon signed with Miami as a free agent on April 8.
“I definitely like that pairing,” Dedmon said, with the Heat practicing Wednesday in advance of hosting Game 3 against the Bucks on Thursday (7:30 p.m., Bally Sports Sun and TNT). “It’s definitely something that coach had talked about doing earlier and finally we did it, especially against the size of Milwaukee. I feel like it worked out good and hopefully we can continue more of that.”
The eight minutes that Adebayo and Dedmon played together in Game 2 didn’t produce noteworthy results. In fact, the Heat was outscored by two points while they shared the court Monday.
But Dedmon, 31, was one of the Heat’s lone bright spots in Game 2, finishing with a team-high 19 points on 8-of-11 shooting and nine rebounds in 21 minutes off the bench. He logged more minutes than the small-ball fours Spoelstra usually likes to play alongside Adebayo — Trevor Ariza (19 minutes in Game 2) and Andre Iguodala (14 minutes in Game 2).
“It was good to switch it up,” Adebayo said. “That’s one thing about Spo. In the playoffs, he’s willing to switch it up. So it was good minutes to get in there with Dewayne. You never know, we might see more of that.”
The Bucks’ answer to the Adebayo-Dedmon pairing in Game 2? Milwaukee eventually began defending Dedmon with 6-2 guard Bryn Forbes and 6-5 guard Pat Connaughton to keep its length and top defenders on Miami stars Adebayo and Jimmy Butler, and the Bucks were able to survive that size disadvantage.
More Adebayo-Dedmon minutes could be a potential fix for the Heat’s rebounding issues in the series. The Bucks outrebounded Miami 61-36 in Game 2, including a 21-9 edge in offensive rebounds.
The Heat wasn’t exactly a dominant, or even good, rebounding team in the small sample size of eight minutes that Adebayo and Dedmon played together in Game 2, with Miami posting a defensive rebounding rate (the percentage of available defensive rebounds a team grabs) of 44.4 percent. That number would have ranked last among NBA teams in the regular season.
But logic says that Dedmon’s impressive rebounding ability at 7 feet and 245 pounds paired with Adebayo’s combination of size and athleticism should solve some of the Heat’s problems on the boards over a larger sample of minutes.
“We just got to be more aggressive on the offensive and defensive glass, and make sure that we’re definitely boxing out their guards,” Dedmon said. “[The Bucks] crash the offensive glass like no other team, especially the guards. So we just got to box out, make sure they don’t get as many offensive rebounds as they did tonight.”
Monday’s Adebayo-Dedmon minutes marked one of the few times in recent years that Spoelstra was willing to play two centers together who both score most of their points in the paint.
Adebayo and rookie Precious Achiuwa played just seven minutes together this season and the Heat was outscored by seven points in those minutes, and Adebayo and Hassan Whiteside played just 66 minutes together in two years before Whiteside was traded and Miami was outscored by 27 points in those minutes.
Spoelstra is generally reluctant to play such a pairing because of offensive spacing issues. He prefers at least one big with three-point range like when he has used stretch centers Kelly Olynyk and Meyers Leonard alongside Adebayo in the past, or small-ball fours like Ariza or Iguodala.
Dedmon isn’t a total non-shooter, though. He has made 156 threes in his NBA career in the regular season, and he’s a career 33.1 percent three-point shooter.
With the way the Bucks defense is structured to sag off of the Heat’s non-shooters to limit opportunities around the basket, there will be room for Dedmon to put up threes to help the offensive spacing if he again plays alongside Adebayo. Dedmon finished 1 of 2 from deep in Game 2, with the one he made coming in rhythm as the trailer in transition.
“I’m not going to be jacking threes all game,” Dedmon said. “If I see an opportunity in a trail position, I’m going to let it go. But that’s not what I’m trying to do. I’m not trying to shoot threes all game. I’m at the rim, trying to protect the rim, get some rebounds. If there’s an opportunity to space the floor with me and Bam, I’ll take advantage of the opportunity. But like I said, we’ll see what happens later on in the series.”
Spoelstra was pleased with Dedmon’s production in Game 2, even during a blowout loss.
“I thought he gave us quality minutes,” Spoelstra said. “His energy, you feel it on both ends of the court. He finds himself in the right spot around the ball quite often.”
But when asked to evaluate Adebayo and Dedmon’s minutes together following Game 2 and the possibility of more moving forward, Spoelstra predictably didn’t want to offer too much insight into his thinking.
“I’ll have to take a look at it,” Spoelstra said.
The dearth of size at power forward (with 6-7 Ariza now starting) and before that, the lack of a physical, defensive bent atthe position (Olynyk was starting before his trade to Houston) contributed to the Heat ranking 19th in rebounding this season.
The Heat is last in the league in rebounding early in the playoffs,with a staggering average rebound differential of minus 19.
This story was originally published May 26, 2021 at 1:11 PM.
