This is an NBA post. If you are completely uninterested, stay tuned, our regular politics programming will return shortly.
So, I guess congrats to the Mavs are due for winning the NBA Championship. I don't really begrudge them their title, they earned it while being discounted and disrespected for the entire season. I generally like it when teams suprise like this, even though we should not have been surprised, they played well all season. So no disrespect intended guys, but I wanted to talk about the losers, the Miami Heat.
For even casual fans of professional baskeball, the Miami Heat and the arrival of the Big Three, Lebron James, Dwayne Wade, and Chris Bosh, is probably well known. Not just for the largely upprecedented nature of these three players leveraging their unrestricted free agency to play together, but the terrible public relations errors James made with his ESPN announcement and the public event in Miami that the Heat put on to introduce the three of them to the fanbase that looked like a Monster Truck rally. The hubris of these events, intended or unintended created a backlash, much of it driven by sports media types who need something to write about during a long 82 game season. Some it driven by fans who get worked up over things like this for reasons I can only guess at.
So when the Heat, whose every stumble was overhyped and every victory equally over-praised, their loss is generating a lot of finger pointed, I-told-you-so-ing, and general James bashing. And its this reaction I think is worth a post.
Let me say that I generally agree with the criticisms of Lebron James in the last few games that he was generally ineffective, at least for him considering his truly awesome skills. No doubt he needs to look at his performance here and seriously look at his approach in these sorts of games and whether it indicates a change in mind set or additions to his playing skillset, or both. But let me point out a few things while the winds of hysteria blow around.
I honestly don't know why anyone would be suprised by what they saw in this series from James and the Heat. Lets consider the reality for a moment:
1. The Heat team was recreated almost from scrach. Wade, Chalmers, and Haslem are really the only regular rotation players left from the previous team. They and the new players basically had to learn how to play with each other on the offensive end from scratch against motivated opponents. That is a difficult proposition in a highly competitive league in a sport where superior team play and chemistry between players is essential. The Mavericks demonstrated the value of this by the clinic on ball movement and disciplined offense they put on throughout the playoffs. The Heat, like many teams in the league, haven't played enough together to develop that.
2. Erik Spolstra emphasized defense almost exclusviely from the first day of training camp. This was a wise choice given the situation he had with guys who had not played together much. Defense is easier to develop quickly because it depends more on effort than mastering complex schemes or developing a feel for a teammates game. And it is essential for success and can generate offense on its own, a type of offense generation well suited to the supremely athletic three players the Heat feature. Both Wade and James are lethal in the open court, and they both play very good one on one defense when committed to it.
3. The reality of the NBA salary cap makes it difficult to commit so much money at once to three players and then recruit the role players every team needs to succeed. The Heat did pretty well given the available role players and the cap space they had. But its obvious they don't have the right pieces yet to really complement their superstars. Miller is a good fit generally and I think Chalmers does fine, but they clearly have needs offensively that the best defenses in the league can exploit. And the Mavericks are an excellent defensive team that is well coached and create match up problems for the Heat. The Heat's complimentary players were assembled with the express purpose of defeating the Celtics. It was not assembled with the Mavericks in mind. That does play a role in the outcome of a 7 game series. Other teams will learn from the Heats demise and I think you will see the usual shift in what players teams look to pluck from free agency and the draft to address these weaknesses of the Heat.
4. The Heat have not developed a consistent system on offense that the big three have bought into that harnesses their skills and keeps them from indulging their worst habits. In particular, a system that emphasizes their ability to get to the basket and create free throw attempts while limiting their jump shot attempts to open looks. The Heat routinely were lured throughout the season into becoming a jump shooting team and even worse, a three point shooting team. Wade and James do not have very good midrange shooting skillsets such as Kobe Bryant has. Bryant develped this skillset specifically to punish teams for sitting in the lap of the Laker big men and closing off the lane. The Heat do not have the shooters right now to do that, and Jame and Wade play right into the hands of defense when they indulge themselves by shooting while being contested.
5. Mentally, the Heat worry too much about how they are perceived. They say all the right things most of the time, but they seem burdened at times by the negative hype. James is very public relations minded, and the blow to his carefully cultivated media image created by his ESPN mistake and subsequent attempts to mitigate it appear to have affected him. They need to stop caring about that. In retrospect, they should have recognized the negative hype was inevitiable and tuned it out. I think they have at times, but James in particular is so attuned to the larger media world, particularly social media, that he gets caught up in it. Stop Tweeting so much and let it go.
6. James has worked to improve his game and it shows. But in my opinion, he needs to work on developing a back to the basket post game that utilizes his unique combination of size and strength. He is an unselfish passer which he does not credit for enough and he makes excellent reads on pick and rolls and other plays. He should be given the ball in the post and force teams to double him or make them pay by backing his man down and either scoring or getting to the line. He is strong enough to take the beating and when he does this most teams will be challenged to deal with it. The Heat need to recognize that although James is a superior player with the ball in his hands facing up on the perimter, they can get the same thing from Wade while taking advantage of James size and skills in the post. They don't and I suspect its in part because its not something James has worked on yet.
The Heat made it to the NBA finals despite all of this, so that shows you the enormous potential they have. They lost to a better team with excellent chemistry and a group of guys who were committed to the hallmarks of that sort of team, unselfish play, crisp and fast ball movement, trust in each other but also accountability. Their coach is a top notch x's and o's guy who knows how to harness what he had. The Heat have a nice nucleus but with considerable overlap in skills between James and Wade. But all these players are in their early prime and over time the heat can sign players to better complement them. So although I belive the Heat deserve some of the beating they are getting, people need to recongize that they did extremely well given thier circumstances, and recognize that they will likey get better. A whole heckuva lot better...
