Heat move on
Hayward picks Boston; Miami presses for Waiters, Johnson
Chris Bosh waived as Hayward picks Celtics.
MIAMI — And so Plan B it will be for the Miami Heat, with Gordon Hayward opting to sign with the Boston Celtics.
Three days after applying a full-court press with the Utah Jazz free-agent forward at American Airlines Arena, Pat Riley and his staff now likely will turn back to the plan initially posed at the end of the season: returning the core that pushed the Heat to a 30-11 record over the second half of the season.
That would put the ball (and cap space) back in the court of Dion Waiters and James Johnson, as well as potentially Wayne Ellington and Luke Babbitt. Ameeting already has been scheduled with Riley regarding Johnson’s free agency, agent Mark Bartelstein told the Sun Sentinel. Bartelstein also represents Hayward.
The Heat’s lost opportunity with Hayward leaves a glaring void at small forward, where undersized Rodney McGruder was the starter last season, with Justise Winslow to return after missing the second half of last season with a shoulder injury,
Hayward had reduced his list of finalists to the Heat, Jazz and Celtics, taking meetings with each over a three-day period that began at Saturday’s start of
“Each meeting (with the three teams) left me convinced that the team I’d just met with was the right fit.” Gordon Hayward
the free-agency negotiation period.
In Hayward, the Heat would have added a wing with the type of shooting range to complement the post power of center Hassan Whiteside and the penetration game of point guard Goran Dragic.
Hayward announced his decision shortly before 8 p.m. Tuesday on The Players’ Tribune, after initial confusion about his destination.
“My meetings with all three teams during this process — Miami, Boston and Utah — were just unbelievable,” he wrote in the first-person essay. “They couldn’t have been more impressive. Each meeting left me convinced that the team I’d just met with was the right fit. And even after I slept on it last night, while I was leaning heavily in one direction . . . I still wasn’t 100-percent convinced about what Iwanted to do.”
The Heat gained the opportunity to pursue Hayward after negotiating to reclaim the cap space of sidelined forward Chris Bosh, who was waived Tuesday.
The Heat’s aggressive push for Hayward came in the wake of Riley stressing at the end of the season and then again after the NBA draft that retaining the team’s 2016-17 core would be the priority, that he had moved on from pursuing high-end talent.
Instead, the Heat attempted to commit nearly $30million to Hayward next season.
By rule, the most the Heat or Celtics, as outside teams, were allowed to offer Hayward was a four-year contract worth $127.8 million. The Jazz, as Hayward’s incumbent team, were eligible to extend maximum of $172.4 million over five years. Hayward ultimately took that maximum four-year deal from Boston, with an opt-out clause after the third season.
Hayward cited his college coach at Butler, Brad Stevens, now coaching the Celtics, as a major factor in his decision.
“There were so many great things pulling me in that direction,” he said. “Therewas the winning culture of Boston, as a city — from the Sox, to the Pats, to the Bruins. There was the special history of the Celtics, as a franchise — from Russell, to Bird, to Pierce, and it goes on. There was the amazing potential of this current Celtics roster, as a team — from ownership, to the front office, to a talented roster with Isaiah, and Al, and everyone else. And of course, there was Coach Stevens: Not just for the relationship that we’ve built off the court — but also for the one that we started building on the court, all of those years ago, in Indiana.”
The Heat currently are working with roughly $34 million in salary-cap space, with the list of remaining wings on the free-agency list limited to the likes of Rudy Gay, Tony Allen, Mike Dunleavy and Arron Afflalo. The Heat could also utilize that cap space in a trade or hold on to it for future use.
The lack of an agreement with Hayward stalls a franchise resurrection in the wake of losing LeBron James back to the Cleveland Cavaliers in 2014 free agency.
Since then, the Heat resigned Dragic in the2015 offseason and signed Whiteside to a four-year, $98 million free-agent contract at the start of 2016 free agency. Both they also lost Dwyane Wade in 2016 free agency to the Chicago Bulls, previously dealing with Bosh’s career-halting blood clots.
The Heat are coming off a 41-41 season that left them a tiebreaker shy of the playoffs. Based on the step back by several Eastern Conference playoff teams, the Heat still could be poised for a return to the playoffs if they can recapture their January-to-April success.