Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Mourning gets encore for Heat at draft lottery
VP returns to stage to represent the No. 14 seed
MIAMI — For the first time during Pat Riley’s stewardship of the Miami Heat there will be an onstage encore at the NBA draft lottery.
After representing the team at the 2015 lottery, when the Heat held their seed with the No. 10 pick that later translated into Justise Winslow, Vice President of Player Programs Alonzo Mourning again is scheduled to be seated in front of the Heat logo in New York for Tuesday’s 8:30 p.m. unveiling of the first 14 selections in the June 22 draft.
This is the fifth time in Riley’s 22 seasons in charge of basketball operations that the Heat have been part of the random-but-weighted process that determines the selection order for non-playoff teams.
Riley represented the Heat on stage at the 2008 lottery, when the Heat went from the No. 1 seed to the No. 2 pick, emerging from that draft with Kansas State forward Michael Beasley, who was selected after Memphis guard Derrick Rose.
Heat 2002 first-round pick Caron Butler represented the Heat on stage at the 2003 lottery, when the Heat went from the No. 4 seed to the No. 5 selection, drafting Marquette guard Dwyane Wade.
Former Heat General Manager Randy Pfund represented the Heat on stage at the 2002 lottery, when the Heat held their No. 10 seed and emerged with Butler, the forward out of
“We’ve kind of targeted players in our quoteunquote wheelhouse.” Adam Simon, Heat staff, on the interview process at the combine
Connecticut.
General Manager Andy Elisburg again is scheduled to represent the Heat behind the scenes, where the actual lottery drawing will take place before ESPN’s televised unveiling of the selection order.
The Heat enter the lottery as the No. 14 seed, with a 0.5 percent chance at the No. 1 selection and a 1.8 percent chance at one of the first three selections, the only selections determined by the weighted draw. The Heat otherwise have a 98.2 percent chance of remaining at No. 14, after finishing at 41-41, falling to make the playoffs by virtue of a tiebreaker with the Chicago Bulls.
A No. 14 seed has never moved up in the lottery.
Like viewers, the team representatives on stage remain unaware of the draft order until it is revealed in inverse order on ESPN.
At the combine
The Heat have 10 representatives at the Chicago draft combine, which included five-on-five play Thursday among secondtier candidates, as well as testing sessions and interviews.
In addition to Riley and Elisburg, also in Chicago are coach Erik Spoelstra, front-office executives Nick Arison, Chet Kammerer, Adam Simon, Shane Battier, Eric Amsler and Keith Askins, as well as scout Bob McAdoo.
The Heat scheduled 20 interviews with prospects in Chicago.
Simon said the Heat’s priorities in Chicago are with players who might not visit Miami, with the Heat also avoiding underclassmen who might opt to return to school by the May 24 NCAA deadline.
“What we try to do is we try to target the players that we know are coming out, the ones that have signed with an agent, not the one that are just trying to gauge their value,” Simon said. “The system doesn’t allow us to get to see everybody. We try to utilize it the best we can. If there was a better way, where we could get to everybody, it would be great. But the timing of the 24th and where you only have a certain amount of time, you might not want to use all those days and hours on players that are just going to go back.”
The Heat do not currently hold a pick in the second round, with much of the current focus at No. 14, potential lottery luck notwithstanding.
“We’ve kind of targeted players in our quote-unquote wheelhouse,” Simon said, with the Heat not releasing their Chicago interview list, “and then we build off of it, and we kind of see who the players that might be drafted in our slot, in our tier, then we try to get guys who are above that, and we try to get as many players as we like behind that.”