The Miami Heat’s success still comes down to getting Jimmy Butler on the court.
Despite having the eighth-best record at the end of the Eastern Conference, they were only four games behind the No. 2 seed.
Hence, depending on how you slice it, the Heat are kind of right there if all of their players are healthy and far behind their competitor, the Boston Celtics, who just won the NBA championship. After all, during the past five seasons, they have made three trips to the conference championships.
The Heat are ready to run it back with the same club that Boston defeated in the first round two months ago, having done very little in free agency ahead of time. At the same time as it makes perfect logic, it sounds like a terrible idea. To sum up, South Beach is a place of contradictions.
And at this moment, that’s just how the Heat feel. According to Barry Jackson’s most recent mailbag for the Miami Herald, the club is happy to continue playing with its present roster.
The Heat think that Miami has primarily lagged behind due to health and availability for games rather than a significant talent shortage. An off-season assessment revealed no change in that judgment, despite the admission that additional work is probably required to win a championship.”
The only players on the squad to participate in more than 70 games the previous season were rookie Jaime Jaquez Jr. and Bam Adebayo. Only one of Jimmy Butler’s 60 games was really played in the postseason, and he was only marginally more accessible than Kevin Love’s 55 games.
Butler is a concern if his availability and health are what have prevented the Heat from winning more, even though they are glad to have him. For the past eight years, he has missed at least 20% of every regular season. He’s available when it counts has always been the argument. Up until the previous season, when it abruptly stopped being true, that was always true. Butler wants a new contract because he turns 35 in September and has a $52 million player option after the 2019–20 season.
It would seem that Miami “probably” needs to let go of Butler in order to win a championship, but the Philadelphia 76ers—who were once the most likely team to trade for Butler—spent that cash and roster slot on Paul George.
Therefore, it’s possible that Miami isn’t idle. It looks like their only choice is to stick with Butler and hope he shows up out of the blue when they need him. And so they are off again.
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