Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Heat pay $65,000 to move up 4 spots in draft — and to get playoff road-court advantage
The Miami Heat effectively paid $65,000 to move up four spots in October’s NBA draft — and gain valuable first-round postseason road-court advantage.
With the league this week releasing both the 2020 playoff pool and 2020 draft order, that is how the math and logistics worked out in advance of the Heat’s opening-round series against the Indiana Pacers — with the NBA Rule Book offering an added bonus.
It all came down to last Friday’s final day of the regular season, a 109-92 Pacers victory over the Heat in a game when both teams rested several starters, with the teams entering tied at 44-28 and assured of meeting in a first-round Nos. 4-5 playoff series.
With its victory, Indiana ended up as the No. 4 seed in the Eastern Conference, which comes with a $287,595 team bonus from the playoff pool. As the No. 5 team, the Heat qualified for a $222,545 team bonus.
However, the loss paid dividends in the draft order, which required tiebreakers among other teams slotted between the Heat and Pacers. At 44-29, the Heat will now select at No. 20. At 45-28, the Pacers will select at No. 24. Had the Heat won last Friday, the Heat and Pacers would have flip-flopped draft slots, with the Heat falling to No. 24. (Which didn’t matter for the Pacers, with their first-round pick going to the Milwaukee Bucks to complete last year’s trade for Malcolm Brogdon.)
As for the homecourt advantage won by the Pacers? There is none, with the best-ofseven opening-round Eastern Conference series played in the void of fans on the neutral courts of Disney’s Wide World of Sports complex, amid the coronavirus pandemic.
In fact, an argument could be made that there actually is a road-court advantage in the Disney setting, with the designated visiting team allowed to choose which basket it will shoot at in each half.
Per the NBA Rule Book:
“The visiting team has the choice of baskets for the first half. The basket selected by the visiting team when it first enters onto the court shall be its basket for the first half. The teams change baskets for the second half. All overtime periods are considered extensions of the second half.”
Most teams, including the Heat, prefer to play defense in front of their bench in the second half to better communicate coverages, a factor enhanced at Disney with the lack of crowd noise. Now the Heat will be afforded that option four times if the series goes the maximum seven games.
The complete order for the Oct. 16 NBA draft will be set after Thursday’s draft lottery. No. 20 is the Heat’s only current selection in the two-round process, with its second-round pick, at No. 50, now held by the Atlanta Hawks.
As for the $65,000 lost by the Heat for dropping to No. 5 in the East, there is $413,534 at stake in the playoff pool between the Heat and Pacers for advancing to the second round. Both teams have received $347,545 for making the playoffs.
The total playoff pool is a record $23,287,266, including $4,124,054 for the team that wins the championship.