Lessons learned, and one risk, of Heat approach. And Antetokounmpo update
It was April 10, 2022 — the final day of the NBA’s regular season — that the Heat stood atop the Eastern Conference standings. It hasn’t happened a single day in four seasons since.
During those four years, which included a miraculous Jimmy Butler-led run from the play-in to the Finals in spring 2023 and three disappointing seasons since, a bunch of teams jumped the Heat. Nine teams finished ahead of them in this season’s Eastern Conference standings.
Those nine do not include the injury-riddled Pacers, who made the Finals last season and played without star guard Tyrese Haliburton this season.
In fairness, the Heat has accomplished substantially more than all of those teams during the past 20 years. (Boston is closest, with four Finals appearances and two titles over that stretch, compared with seven and three for the Heat.)
And it shouldn’t be glossed over that most of these teams passed the Heat because they secured high draft picks as a result of intentional tanking or lots of organic losing.
Three to 10 years of tanking or relentless losing helped Charlotte, Toronto, Detroit, Philadelphia and Cleveland at least get further than the Heat this season (for the Hornets, only a smidgen further).
The Magic also assembled a roster of four top-seven draft picks mostly by losing a lot but has no playoff series wins (since 2010) to show for it.
The Heat, frankly, could have schooled many of these teams on roster-building for the first 25 years of the Pat Riley era.
For the Heat, there’s no lesson to be learned from tanking. There’s no lesson to be learned from Cleveland acquiring Donovan Mitchell, because a source with direct knowledge insists that Utah would have accepted no package from Miami that didn’t include Bam Adebayo.
So I’m not going to sit here and say that most of these teams that jumped the Heat have discovered the magic elixir.
But in our view, there are a few lessons that could be learned — or at least ideas worth considering — from what other teams did the past four years:
▪ Boston: There’s no lesson to be learned from landing generational talents high in the lottery (Jayson Tatum, Jaylen Brown). That’s why the Celtics have been good for years. And Boston failed to make it out of the first round, so we’re not going to hold up the Celtics as roster savants.
But the Celtics have done a somewhat better job than most teams during the past few years of finding diamonds in the rough, especially Sam Hauser (undrafted) and two bigs who were drafted in the second round by other teams, Neemias Queta and Luka Garza. Queta joined the Celtics in 2024-25 on a two-way deal. Garza signed with Boston on a two-year, $5.5 million deal last summer.
Now let’s be clear: The Heat’s development game has been top tier over many years. From Duncan Robinson to Max Strus to Gabe Vincent to second-rounder Pelle Larsson, few teams have been as effective finding diamonds in the rough as the Heat. Larsson was a second-round revelation. Miami found Haywood Highsmith and made a very good under-the-radar trade for Davion Mitchell.
And in fairness, the Heat has continued to nail picks in the teens in the draft with Kel’el Ware and Jaime Jaquez Jr.
But the undrafted shooter pipeline has been a bit dry since Miami unearthed Robinson. Now it’s time to find another undrafted Robinson and an undrafted big who’s good enough to crack a rotation.
▪ Indiana and Toronto: We understand the Heat doesn’t like trading a good player for another good player unless it believes the move clearly improves the team.
But sometimes, simply shuffling the pieces can help, in our view. In dealing Pascal Siakam in January 2024 and acquiring Brandon Ingram 13 months later, Toronto didn’t appreciably increase its talent. And in trading OG Anonoby for RJ Barrett and Immanuel Quickley, the Raptors didn’t appreciably increase their talent, and they kept losing for a while.
But those three deals, combined with Scottie Barnes’ continued development, created a fresh and better mix and sparked a franchise turnaround, from 30 wins last season to 46 this season. They didn’t get out of the first round of the playoffs. But the fresh mix seemed to help.
Then there’s Indiana. In 2022, the Pacers traded a player who had been a two-time All Star still in his prime (Domantas Sabonis) for a point guard (Tyrese Haliburton) who had never been an All Star.
Then they dealt Bruce Brown, Jordan Nwora, and three first-round draft picks for Siakam. Those deals and other smart moves - including signing T.J. McConnell in 2019 — spearheaded last spring’s Finals run.
The Heat is fine with making lateral moves, as it did with Denis Schroder for Davion Mitchell (a deal the Heat won) and Duncan Robinson for Simone Fontecchio.
But the Heat does not believe that changing for change’s sake is the answer. It doesn’t believe in the notion of a roster growing stale.
▪ New York: Let’s be real: The Knicks have risen to this spot mostly because they smartly projected that Jalen Brunson would be far better than he was before coming to the Knicks. Give them credit for that evaluation.
To a lesser extent, asset collection was a factor, too.
Knicks president Leon Rose hasn’t built a team that has (at least yet) made an NBA Finals, but he smartly collected tradable draft capital with several moves, including dealing the 11th pick in 2022 (Ousmane Dieng) to Oklahoma City for three future-first round picks.
As it was explained to me, the Heat doesn’t prioritize collecting a bunch of first-round picks (though it got one in the Jimmy Butler trade with Golden State) because it’s trying to win every year. We get it. It’s a noble approach.
The Heat has positioned itself pretty well with player assets (combined with essentially three tradeable firsts) to make a run at Giannis Antetokounmpo or another star. But if a team with more first-round draft inventory beats out the Heat for Antetokounmpo or another star, then the Heat’s approach with asset collection is a topic that should be internally revisited.
▪ Philadelphia: For the Heat or anyone else, there’s absolutely nothing to be learned from a franchise that botched The Process and remains without a single Eastern Conference finals appearance to show for it.
The only lesson for Miami? Take the best Kentucky player; it usually works. Miami should have done it and selected Tyrese Maxey over Precious Achiuwa in November 2020, the Heat’s only egregious draft mistake since taking Justise Winslow over Devin Booker in 2015.
In Miami’s defense, Tyler Herro had emerged in the Disney bubble a month earlier, and Miami needed a power forward. But Maxey could have been the missing piece on those Butler/Adebayo teams.
▪ Atlanta and Toronto and Orlando. This can be summed in one word: Length! And adequate positional size.
As Anthony Chiang and I explained here, the Heat needs players who are longer and in some cases, simply taller or bulkier. Pat Riley admitted as much. It needs to be an offseason priority, and we sense it will be.
Antetokounmpo update
The Heat could get clarity on whether it’s getting Antetokounmpo by the start of the NBA Draft on June 23. Bucks co-owner Jimmy Haslam suggested the Bucks would like to make a decision by that time.
“I just think before the draft is a natural time,” Haslam said. “Because if Giannis does play somewhere else, we’ve got to have a lot of assets. We will do what’s best for Giannis and what’s best for the organization. We don’t know whether Giannis will stay with us or not.”
Here was my recent piece on the factors working for and against the Heat in its continued pursuit of the two-time MVP. The trade landscape could change somewhat based on the results of Sunday’s 3 p.m. NBA draft lottery, when the Heat — slotted 13th — has a 4.8% chance to land a top four pick.
A final thought
I would make one other point on the Heat’s approach, which remains focused (not entirely, but mostly) on finding a top-10 NBA player to pair with Adebayo and the team’s young players.
The Heat’s decision to try to achieve that, instead of simply shuffling the decks with lateral moves, or tanking, can be appreciated. It’s a defensible strategy.
But like any possible team-building strategy that the Heat or any team could pick, it comes with a risk. And no guarantees.
What if the star search doesn’t materialize? Would the Heat go yet another season with this nucleus?
Waiting on a star — just like tanking — comes with no assurance of a payoff, and no end date.
That’s why there’s one part of the Heat’s plan that I would tweak:
I understand keeping Adebayo and continuing efforts to land a star. But isn’t there a point at which the Heat must give up and say ‘we’ve tried for years and we must pivot to dealing Adebayo for a bunch of first-round picks before he exits his prime and loses his value?’
There’s no shame in that, but it seems that point does not exist for the Heat in any world, considering how Pat Riley said Adebayo will not be traded. But I’m not sure why the Heat would want to rule out that option as a last resort.
It’s reasonable to give the star search the rest of this offseason, or through next year’s trade deadline, or even into the summer of 2027 (when Miami should have ample cap space).
But if the whale hasn’t been harpooned by next summer, at the very latest, the Heat should pivot and parlay Adebayo into assets — unless it somehow finds a superstar in next month’s draft or misses the playoffs next year and finds a star in the lottery in 13 months. (The 2027 Heat first-round pick due Charlotte is top-14 protected in 2027 and would convey in 2028 if it’s not sent to the Hornets in 2027.)
No, the Heat shouldn’t be looking to deal Adebayo before trying another year to find a genuine, All-NBA leading man. But there needs to be an end date to all of this, too.
Preseason home games announced
The Heat announced Thursday that it will play three preseason home games: Oct. 8 against New Orleans, Oct. 10 vs. Minnesota and Oct. 14 vs. the Nets. Tickets are on sale at heat.com.
This story was originally published May 7, 2026 at 2:00 PM.
