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The Heat were 39-43 last season. They had only won one playoff game in the past three years. They had missed the postseason entirely in three of the past five years. His payroll was inflated. James Johnson, Dion Waiters and Kelly Olynyk had several seasons left on their negative value contracts. Hassan Whiteside and Ryan Anderson had expensive deals, if only for one more season. Miami’s roster, weighted by playing time, was higher than the league average. The Heat owed a future first-round pick after trading for Goran Dragic years earlier.
For many, the situation seemed ripe for sinking. Miami could lose, pick high in the draft, trade its good players for more draft picks and eventually escape mediocrity.
Instead, the Heat handed over a first-round pick to give Jimmy Butler, 30, a maximum contract.
Now, Miami is in the final of the conference.
ESPN’s Brian Windhorst:
“Each team’s situation is different, that’s just a fact,” said a league general manager. “But there are probably owners who will look at what the Heat have done and think, ‘Why can’t we do that?’ instead of hitting bottom and then building again. “
Another head office executive said: “There are many different ways to win. But the Heat made this change happen faster than normal, and that doesn’t go unnoticed by the people who have been losing. “
The Heat’s rebuilding stands in stark contrast to The Process. The 76ers sucked for four miserable seasons to rack up assets. The reward (up to this point)? Two second and one first round starts.
Miami is over it.
Led by Pat Riley, the Heat have a great culture. They developed undrafted Duncan Robinson and Kendrick Nunn, and first-round players Bam Adebayo and Tyler Herro into key contributors (and second-round player Josh Richardson, whom Miami traded for Butler). That happens, in part, because the Heat are relentlessly focused on winning.
Tank teams perform better at accumulating assets. But they often struggle to keep young players focused and engaged amidst losses.
These are tradeoffs, and successful organizations strike the right balance.
One little-discussed aspect of the tank, though: it’s a form of job preservation for executives who implement it. General managers are evaluated in the long term winning and losing. But takedown executives effectively delay starting the clock with judgment, buying overtime in their comfortable positions.
Riley had the job security of not resorting to such tricks and is succeeding in her plan.
Perhaps more attention should be paid to the fact that the Heat missed the playoffs in three of the previous five seasons and it is not certain that they will remain at this level as Butler and Dragic age. Perhaps it should be considered more that Miami presented style issues for the Bucks and might not have advanced beyond the second round with a different matchup, even against a team smaller than Milwaukee. Perhaps not every team has a market to attract stars like Butler (and former stars LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh, who helped bolster the Heat’s reputation).
But the results are striking. The context is not always fully considered. Miami jumped from the lottery to the conference finals in just one season.
In a knockoff league, that puts the pressure on executives who preach patience.
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