A perilous playoff push
Better health will help, but road to postseason still could be bumpy.
CLEVELAND — It has been a season of gut punches for the Miami Heat, and players could not pack their designer luggage fast enough to get out of Cleveland late Wednesday and start their All-Star break.
No one can blame them
After enduring constant upheaval, Miami goes into the break with a tenuous grip on the No. 8 seed in the Eastern Conference at 22-30 and figures to be in a six-team scrum for the playoffs over the final 30 games.
The Heat are battling fellow stragglers such as Charlotte and Boston, whereas a year ago they only thing they battled was boredom on their way to the Finals. While the
former position is preferable, this situation promises to be more stimulating.
“When you have a 30-game sprint and there’s a mad scramble at the end and every night you’re looking at the standings, it’s some of the best of what this league can offer,” coach Erik Spoelstra said. “It’s absolute fierce competition, and that’s what you want.
“When you’re in an absolute fight for your life like this, these are the times you remember years later.”
It’s no mystery how the Heat got here. Plan A went out the window months ago, and they can rarely get to Plan B. Team President Pat Riley’s blueprint required everything to go right, but plenty has gone wrong.
Miami had more than 100 injury-related absences in the first 52 games and has started 15 players, the second-highest total in the NBA. The ideal lineup of Mario Chalmers, Dwyane Wade, Luol Deng, Chris Bosh and Hassan Whiteside has played 28 minutes together and has not started since Jan. 20.
“I don’t even want much — all I’m asking is to be healthy and have all our guys out there,” Bosh said. “I can live with the rest. If we just have our guys out there, if we can have a unit and consistency in the lineup, that’s all I want.”
The trouble began with multi-talented power forward Josh McRoberts missing training camp. He was an exciting acquisition, but lasted 17 games before sustaining a season-ending knee injury.
The Heat have one proficient guard, Wade, and he’s missed 17 games. They are 7-10 without him. Wade began the season believing his knee trouble was in the past. It appears to be, but he has had three hamstring issues. When healthy, he is averaging 21.4 points and 5.4 assists.
Chalmers has been inconsistent as Wade’s fillin and at point guard. No facet of the team has been more problematic than the trio at point. Miami sent rookie Shabazz Napier to the D-League twice, and Norris Cole is having the worst shooting season of his career.
Is there a bright side? The thought that Whiteside is ascending is a good starting point, but everything else is a guess. Napier seems to be catching on, but that is hard to sustain. And no one can project how many of the final 30 games Wade will play or whether high-mileage guys like Bosh and Deng can get through the home stretch healthy.
“We just want to see everybody in the jersey together, hopefully for 30 games,” Wade said. “That would be amazing, especially for this team. That would be an unbelievable feat.”
This is the Heat’s best chance to get right and start fresh. They have six days off — except for Bosh, who is playing in Sunday’s All-Star game at Madison Square Garden — before resuming practice Wednesday in advance of their Feb. 20 game at New York.
When whole last month, Miami posted road wins over the Bulls and Clippers, then competed with Oklahoma City until the end. The Heat’s optimism is founded on performances like that, as well as the belief that their core is strong enough to charge into the postseason rather than limp there.
“There’s no point in predicting anything,” Deng said. “We’ve just got to get everyone healthy, then we’ve got two months to go extremely hard and take our chances.”