Season Preview: Miami Heat

Quang: What a difference two years can make. it seemed like only yesterday dwyane wade and shaq fell behind 0-2 to the favored mavericks in the nba finals only to lead the heat back with four straight wins, clinching the championship. during their victory parade, dwyane wade was heralded as the league's best player, shaq promised to win the nba finals again next year, and pat riley had assumed the mark madsen role of weird dancer on championship team. well more than a year later, dwyane wade is coming back from several injuries that hurt bad enough that he cried, shaq is apparently a liar, and the only dancing pat riley does is dance dance revolution at the local arcade, or more likely, he's not dancing at all. what happened? well miami's "15 strong" played like "15 wrong". shaq and dwyane combined for a toal of 91 games and the rest of the team was so bad, that chris quinn was once asked to start a game. a basketball game! the heat managed to cobble together a decent run after falling a season-high six games under .500. they finished the year on a 25-13 run, especially impressive considering dwyane wade missed 23 games during that stretch.

the heat enter this season hoping to atone for a humiliating first round sweep by the no name chicago bulls. dwyane wade will not be ready for the beginning of the season, but since the heat went 16-7 in games he missed due to his shoulder injury, perhaps they don't need him. that is of course ridiculous. wade is by far their most important player and if he misses more than month, the heat could be in trouble. shaq's still a handful, but his status as league's most dominant is about to be revoked. can he still carry a team if he plays less than half an hour of basketball a night? and who does miami call on beyond these two? udonis haslem is their next best player, but he's an ideal complimentary player and if he were to scream "i demand double teams!" he would be mostly ignored. alonzo mourning is still playing well but the heat need offense more than they need defense and someone who gets dunked on because he tries to block every shot. jason williams is supposedly healthy. though he's not much better than average at this point, he is good enough to limit smush parker's mintues. backing those two up is chris quinn, who i can't believe has played 408 nba minutes while chris thomas, his superior teammate from notre dame, has played zero.

other than wade's injury status, the other thing i'm interested in seeing is how the few young heat players play. miami drafted daequan cook in the first round. he's a potent scorer who parlayed a season playing with oden and junior conley into a guaranteed nba contract. he might not contribute much to this veteran team this year, but he could become a good option behind wade in the future. the most talked about miami youth is dorell wright. he's immensely talented and wildly athletic, but this appears to be his last stand. he needs to prove that he's more than just promise or he'll be searching for a new team come summer. i'm hopeful he can learn a few things from penny hardaway, like how to be as incredible as he used to be and how to get great shoes as he used to wear and how to get a lil dorell like he used to have. it's not out of the realm of possibility that he can become the scottie pippen to wade's michael jordan. though i think the heat would be pleased if he just becomes the walt williams to wade's mitch richmond. of course then they'd be displeased that dwyane wade had slightly regressed, but one problem at a time.

an interesting recent development regarding the heat involves speculation about a ricky davis and mark blount for antoine walker and friends trade. i don't like this trade for several reasons, but primarily because dorell wright was all but guaranteed a starting spot coming into the season. personally, i'd rather take my chances with dorell wright and antoine walker, but i've never met pat riley and i sir, am no pat riley. on the outside, this trade is mainly due to antoine walker failing to meet pat riley's conditioning standards. unlike other contributors to this site, i'm not an antoine walker apologist. but let's not forget that the man was robbed at gunpoint in his own house very recently. if i was robbed at gunpoint in my own house, i wouldn't be in shape for work either. but that doesn't mean i wouldn't be able to go to work and do my job effectively and fire away threes from midcourt. so let's cut antoine some slack before we start trading him for headcases. anyways overall, i think the heat are still a playoff team, though how well they finish is going to be determined by dwyane wade. depending on his health, the heat could finish as high as the third seed and as low as the seventh seed.

Joe: If I was 6'9, and averaged 18 points, 8 boards and 4 assists and also provided the added bonus of shooting 33% from three point land across an 11 year NBA career, I would have very few detractors, everyone would say that I had a solid career and probably an All-Star level player. But if I were to tell you the same thing and add that my name is Antoine Walker peoples reactions toward me would change quicker than I could launch a three and do a shimmy-shake. Now that I think about it, I think I'm the only person in the world that thinks Antoine Walker is a good player. The man has one of the most complete inside, outside games I've seen from a player 6'8 or above in the past decade, and while he does get shot happy sometimes the bottom line is shooting threes is fun - and everybody always wants to see NBA players "have fun out there" right?

Just like my opinions are off the beaten path with Employee Number 8, I am also of the opinion that the Miami Heat are definitely not washed up yet. Seems like everyone has forgotten what Dwayne Wade is capable of when healthy. This term thats going around "The NEW NBA" was coined because of how difficult Dwayne Wade is to guard. When you couple Wade's leadership and ability with the old gray-beards down low and the still impressive crop of role player that the Heat have collected over the years and this is still one of the most dangerous teams in basketball. Pat Riley is going to expect alot from his young flourishing swing-man Dorell Wright who at this point will be the only other source of consistent perimeter scoring besides Wade. A real area of concern for the coach is point guard play. While Jason Williams has been serviceable, he provides little in the way of defense and has suffered from nagging injuries in the past couple of years. While fresh legs have been bough on board in the form of Smush Parker, aside from hitting the occasional three, he brings little to nothing in the form of court awareness on either side of the ball. If Pat Riley could get Shaq, Alonzo and Walker motivated for one last run at the championship, then outsource all the real work to Wade we will have a serious contender on our hands.

Dhivy: The hopes of the Miami Heat were dashed last year when Dwyane Wayne separated his shoulder on a seemingly harmless play. To mask the tears, the normally stoic Wayne was forced to flip down his shades. I have to take most of the responsibility for this, as I bought his jersey before the season started. Previous jerseys I’ve bought include Grant Hill and Ken Griffey Jr., two Hall of Fame players whose careers were derailed by injuries. I thought Dwyane was good enough to avoid me jinxing him, but apparently I’m just that powerful. Hopefully he can bounce back and prove that it’s a different world from where you come from.

Late-eighties Cosby spin-offs aside, this could be a defining year for the Heat. With an aging roster, the window is closing on their championship aspirations. The center tandem of Shaq, ‘Zo, and Doleac have a combined 38 years in the league, making injuries inevitable. Shaq has already lost a step or two and he is far more prone to foul trouble thanks to his reduced mobility. Apparently ‘fu’ is short for ‘fu*king slow’.

How the rest of the supporting cast can assist Wade will determine this team’s fate. Pat Riley has made it known that he’s not into fat chicks, as Antoine Walker has been benched until he can get his weight down. Udonis Haslem and Wayne Simien are capable rebounders and defenders, but look for Dorell Wright to provide a scoring punch at forward. Wright showed flashes of brilliance last year and will bring some serious excitement to this team. Of course, the Heat live and die on the exploits of Dwyane Wade, and his game is going to have to reach another level for the Heat to be competitive.

While Wade plays point at times, the traditional point guards on the Heat might cause some head scratching. The team was unhappy with the play of Jason Williams, so they brought in Smush Parker. This is tantamount to being unhappy with having the flu and getting chicken pox instead. This move also relegates Chris Quinn to a smaller role, which is a step closer to the role he should be filling: non-NBA player. Some might question what if any impact an aging Penny Hardaway can have on this team. But if ‘Blue Chips’ has taught us anything, it’s that Penny is great at throwing game-winning alley-oops to Shaq and asking Pat Riley “they gonna take my momma’s house and job?” Based on their backcourt aside from D-Wade, this team would be better described as the Miami Tepid.

Based in part on Wade's lingering injuries, the Heat are talking about bringing in Ricky Davis and Mark Blount for Walker, Simien, and Doleac. I want this trade to happen just because it would involve two of the NBA players I hate the most: Walker and Davis. Who shoots at his own rim to try and get a triple-double? That's not even how a rebound works. As much as I hate him, Davis is a capable scorer and can be a mentor for Dorell Wright, assuming the heat are trying to turn Dorell into an overrated slacker with a messy goatee and no heart. The other players are primarily involved for cap purposes and Blount would have a minimal impact on the Heat. Pat Riley must be spinning in his grave.

Achilles Heel

• Smush Parker (q)
• Smush Parker (j)
• Smush Parker (d)

Unsung Hero

• Udonis Haslem (q)
• Udonis Haslem (j)
• Dorell Wright (d)

Bold Prediction

• Shaq's comment comparing his past and present sidekicks to the Corelone brothers in the Godfather movies becomes eerily prophetic when Penny breaks Dwyane Wade's heart and Dwyane Wade has Penny murdered on a boat. (q)
• Alonzo Mourning will get a block, and he won't be demonstrative. There is no longer hunger in the world. (j)
• Antoine Walker admits in a post-game interview that he eats because he’s unhappy, and he’s unhappy because he eats. (d)

Favorite Memory

• During an All Star game practice, Shaq dance fought several of his Eastern Conference teammates. It was the biggest robot I've ever seen (q)
• Every member of the Heat roster tries to guard Jamal Crawford - they don't even come close to stopping him as he goes off for 52 points. (j)
• Udonis Haslem throwing his mouth guard at Joey Crawford (d)