Josh McRoberts’ game is not about numbers

To the casual basketball fan, Josh McRoberts is never going to be a household name. McRoberts has never been one to compile gaudy stat lines, or pose a triple-double risk. This was never more evident when he signed a four-year, $23 million deal with the Miami Heat. Many people couldn’t understand why Pat Riley locked down a player for four years who was just coming off an 8.5 point per game season in Charlotte.

While the majority didn’t quite get it, there were a few of us who knew that Charlotte just lost their spark plug, their linchpin that made them watchable. McRoberts was to those Bobcats teams what uranium was to the Delorean. There was an understated brilliance to what he did for Charlotte, whether it was making that extra pass, or being ready to hit the open three.

Before Miami’s game in Minnesota on November 5 McRoberts told me that, “I’m never gonna be a big stat guy, you know what I’m saying?”

“I’m never going to have a bunch of stats or a bunch of numbers where people go, ‘Oh yeah, that’s…’ you know?”

In fact, McRoberts is the type of player that coaches want. A guy who understands the value of the little things, and how they add up over the course of a basketball game. When coaches talk about moving the ball and communication, they sound simple, but there’s a reason they’re mentioned and blamed for a team’s shortcomings so often.

“I think for me I just move the ball,” said McRoberts letting us in on his secret to success. “On the offensive end I try to [move the ball] and communicate as much as possible on defense. I understand that my game’s not made for people who really appreciate, you know I play for my team, my teammates. That sort of thing.”

Typically you’ll see a guard take on the responsibility of communicating, or being the one to initiate the ball movement offensively. Usually it’s not a team’s first big man off of the bench, but that is what McRoberts has done to stay in the league as long as he has.

Certainly McRoberts must’ve developed this mentality playing as a guard until a growth spurt in high school, right? Wrong. It’s how he has always played, even as the tall kid in his class.

“As I was growing up I kinda learned the game as a whole more than a position. I think when I was younger when I got to play, I was one of the bigger kids of my age,” said McRoberts.  “And I’d play with older kids and get to play on the wing and handle the ball more. I was kinda taught a whole game rather than one position.”

“I was lucky to kind of have that– to not be pigeonholed. Like, ‘Oh, he’s a big guy go play down low,’  which I did when I was younger, but when I was a bigger guy I learned to do that as well. But I was kinda able to learn the game as a whole.”

Thanks to having intelligent coaches who didn’t limit his development based on height-based skills, McRoberts has been able to develop a well-rounded game that has allowed him to continue at the highest level.

That also includes shooting, as McRoberts has consistently been a threat from beyond the arc. Before tearing his meniscus last season and missing 65 games, he was shooting 42.1 percent from three — just shy of his career high 42.9 percent he posted in Los Angeles in 2012. McRoberts sees his shooting as “a part of the game you gotta take advantage of to open up everything else.”

Playing for the Heat and for Eric Spoelstra is a perfect fit given the team’s history of valuing bigs who can step out and hit shots and not be limited by traditional positional ideals. Playing next to someone like Chris Bosh gives the team two players capable of moving the ball and stretching the floor.

Because of his injury, this feels like McRoberts’ first true season in Miami. Once again he is moving well off the ball, and slinging around the perimeter to the teammate with the best shot.

Though McRoberts’ shot hasn’t started to fall again, he doesn’t sound too concerned.

“Like I said, my game ain’t numbers. If you’re waiting for numbers, you’re going to be disappointed. So, you know, I don’t worry about numbers. I worry about doing the right things for the team, and if my coaches and teammates like me, and like what I’m doing, I’m happy. “

McRoberts is right: the Heat didn’t bring him in to be a scorer. With Bosh, Dwyane Wade, Goran Dragic, and others, they simply don’t need him to. As long as he is able to swing the ball, hit the occasional open three, and call out screens, both McRoberts and the Heat will be satisfied.

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