Riley challenges Adebayo, Herro as Heat’s next step could come through internal improvement
Unless a disgruntled star becomes available on the trade market, the Miami Heat’s best chance of taking another step forward next season will come through internal improvement.
The two young players who the Heat expect more from after putting together career-best years this past season: Bam Adebayo and Tyler Herro.
“I think we’re in that window of internal improvement,” Heat president Pat Riley said Monday during his news conference to wrap up the season when speaking about the roster as a whole.
But Riley specifically pointed to Adebayo, 24, and Herro, 22, as members of the Heat’s core who will be relied on to provide more next season as co-stars alongside Jimmy Butler.
Of Adebayo, Riley sees room for improvement offensively and believes “there’s another level at his age now that we need more consistency in his ability to get good shots, create good shots for himself and us and score.”
Of Herro, Riley emphasized continued growth on the defensive end and noted that “if you want to win a championship and you want to be a starter, you really have to become a two-way player today and you have to improve in certain areas of your game.”
Adebayo was again a defensive force this past season, finishing fourth in the Defensive Player of the Year voting and earning a spot on the NBA’s All-Defensive Second Team for the third consecutive year. He also averaged career-highs in points (19.1 per game) and shot attempts (13 per game) to go with 10.1 rebounds, 3.4 assists and 1.4 steals per game in his third full season as the Heat’s starting center.
Despite those impressive numbers, Adebayo still has plenty of space to expand his offensive game. While shooting 73.2 percent from inside the restricted area, he shot 42.2 percent on all other two-pointers (126 of 279 or 45.2 percent on non-rim paint shots and 42 of 119 or 35.3 percent on midrange attempts) and 0 of 6 on threes this regular season for an effective field goal percentage (measures field goal percentage adjusting for made threes being more valuable than made twos) of 55.9 percent that ranked in the NBA’s 46th percentile among bigs, according to Cleaning the Glass.
Adebayo also generated 0.98 points per possession (63rd percentile in the NBA) in post-up situations this regular season.
“He can be very prolific at times,” Riley said. “But it can’t always just be on effort, on running, on offensive rebounds, on lob dunks, on little floaters. I do think there’s a part of him that can grow.”
Riley wants Adebayo to find more consistency in creating his own scoring opportunities. Just in the Eastern Conference finals, Adebayo’s aggressiveness in that department fluctuated with four shots attempts in Game 1, six shot attempts in Game 2, 22 shot attempts in Game 3, five shot attempts in Game 4, 15 shot attempts in Game 5, six shot attempts in Game 6 and 21 shot attempts in Game 7.
“This could be a year, and [Erik Spoelstra] and I will sit down and talk about how can Bam be developed in a way to improve his consistent shot ability every night,” Riley said, “Getting 15 shots every night and quality shots that he can get, that he can create. Whether it’s in the post, whether it’s at the elbow or whatever.”
As for Herro, he closed the regular season as the Heat’s second-leading scorer with a career-high 20.7 points per game in a bench role to become the first player in franchise history to win the NBA’s Sixth Man of the Year award. Herro did it while shooting a career-best 44.7 percent from the field and 39.9 percent from three-point range, while averaging a career-high four assists in his third NBA season.
Herro’s production dipped this postseason, as he averaged just 12.6 points while shooting 40.9 percent from the field and 22.9 percent from three-point range and 2.8 assists in this year’s playoffs. A groin injury also forced Herro to miss part of the East finals.
Herro is a natural scorer, but his individual defense remains a work in progress with teams often hunting him on switches to test him on that end of the court. With some physical limitations at 6-5 and 195 pounds, Herro allowed 1.12 points per possession in isolation situations (17th percentile in the NBA) this regular season.
“I saw improvement in his defense this year,” Riley said. “He’s got great feet. He’s got quick feet. He just needs to get stronger again and another 10 pounds of muscle mass and he just needs to get stronger from a leverage standpoint because I think he still has a lot of upside.”
Herro mentioned during exit interviews last week that he hopes to be promoted to a starting role next season. He has started in just 33 of the 175 regular-season games he has appeared in during his first three NBA seasons.
“I would like to start,” said Herro, who is eligible to sign a contract extension with the Heat this offseason worth as much as $181 million over five seasons. “I think it’s my fourth year, so hopefully I’ve earned it and we’ll see what happens.”
But Riley made it known that Herro hasn’t earned that starting spot yet.
“As far as being a starter, come to training camp and win it,” Riley said. “Come to training camp and win it. Sometimes it’s that easy and sometimes the fit, as Spo talked about over the two or three years, he was better for us coming in balancing the energy of scoring and having somebody that can really control the ball. If he wants to be a starter, we’ll see in October. That’s something that you earn and there’s no doubt that he has the qualities to be that.”
While issuing challenges to Adebayo and Herro entering an important offseason for both players, Riley also made sure to compliment them too.
Of Adebayo, Riley said: “He’s been asked to do a lot of things as a young player and he has grown into being very efficient at doing these things. It’s that learning curve of being a facilitating big, either at the elbow on handoffs, on pick-and-rolls or whatever he’s doing. He’s always getting somebody open.”
Of Herro, Riley added: “I think his numbers speak for him and his game. Averaging 20 a game and really shooting the ball well, developing a game that at times during the regular season is unstoppable for him to try to find a shot. He can find and create his own shots in a lot of different situations.”
But Riley’s message was loud and clear. More will be needed and expected from Adebayo and Herro next season.
“I like the core,” Riley said of the Heat’s current mix. “So let’s see where we can go internally, and let’s see where we can go if something presents itself – if that’s a viable option.”
This story was originally published June 7, 2022 at 10:19 AM.
