Once “The Decision” was made on July 8 and LeBron James took his ‘talents’ to South Beach, the Miami Heat were thought to never lose another game. A team consisting of only LeBron James, Dwayne Wade, Chris Bosh, Mario Chalmers and Michael Beasley would be enough and everything else would just fall into place. But how has it all played out to this point?
After James decided to leave Cleveland with only their historic track record of losing sports teams, Beasley, the second overall draft pick in 2008, was quickly dealt because he never lived up to the Heat’s expectations for only a second round draft pick to the Minnesota Timberwolves. This made room for the addition of Mike Miller, free agent sharpshooter from the Washington Wizards.
Because James, Wade and Bosh all signed max contracts, and Miller for 5 years and $30 million, the Heat were only allowed to sign additional players for the league minimum to fill their roster. But who wouldn’t want to play the new ‘Big 3’ and ride their coattails to the NBA Finals.
While the Heat were able to resign Udonis Haslem, they had to settle for two players that may be pushing 50. Juwan Howard, the last remaining piece from Michigan’s Fab Five and James’ former big man and one more injury away from being 6 foot, Zydrunas Ilgauskas. They also signed Carlos Arroyo and James Jones. Maybe not the players they had in mind, but the Bulls had Jud Buechler, Steve Kerr, Luc Longley and Bill Wennington when they set the best record in NBA history going 72-10.
Now the team is set, all that’s left to do is set it on cruise control and beat the Lakers in the NBA Finals, right? But before the season even started, the Heat started to run into some speed bumps. Wade missed the whole preseason after injuring his hamstring 3 minutes into their first game. Then Mike Miller injured his right thumb when it got entangled in another player’s jersey during practice, probably a failed titty twister attempt, but in any case scheduled to be out till January.
But all was good when Wade was ruled healthy to start in the season opener against the Boston Celtics. That soon turned into the only good news of the night after the Heat were beat pretty handily.
The Heat are now 10-8 on the young season. Haslem is out for an extended period of time, had to turn to free agent Erick Dampier and are 1-7 against teams that are above .500. What happened to the team that my favorite announcer, Jeff Van Gundy, predicted could beat the Bulls record?
Their problem — Pat Riley? Riley treated the offseason like a MMA fight, bullying his way to the top. He let his big ego and forehead get in front of what was best for the team. Last summer had arguably the best free agent class ever, with players that included James, Wade and Bosh, but also Dirk Nowitzki, Amare Stoudemire, Joe Johnson, Carlos Boozer and David Lee. Riley tried to prove that he wasn’t just a great coach, but could be one of the best GMs as well. That he could put all his eggs in one basket and come out with the best 3 free agents. Prove that he had the biggest balls and best hair in the business.
The Heat don’t know how to play together. James and Wade are too similar. Bosh is soft. They lack play from the point guard and center positions. All things that Riley should have thought about during the summer, not at the trade deadline when they are fighting for 5th seed in the playoffs, praying they don’t play the Celtics in the playoffs. Or is it part of his master plan to take over the team again and steal the glory like he did in 2006?