Mediocrity is in the cards for the Heat

Mediocrity is the worst place to be for an NBA team intent on competing for championships. As teams either fight for wins to secure home-court advantage or throw away a game or two to add to their ping-pong balls on lottery night, the teams in the middle are stuck, not bad enough to secure top talent in the draft but not good enough to really contend for that year’s title. Of course, a middling team in a specific year doesn’t necessarily mean that team is stuck there, but the teams who are perpetually mediocre are the ones to worry about.

Which brings us to the Miami Heat, who have been the very definition of not mediocre over the past decade and a half. First it was Dwyane Wade, then it was LeBron James and Chris Bosh, bringing three championships and a whole lot of talent to South Beach. Ever since James departed for Cleveland, however, things have gotten decidedly worse for Miami, but not so bad that they’ve had a draft pick higher than 10th overall. In an attempt to bounce back immediately, Pat Riley and his staff have mortgaged their future assets to try to find the short cut to the success they demand and given out large contracts to otherwise mostly unwanted players to retain ones who had performed well in their famous workaholic culture.

The cupboard is pretty barren for a Miami team that looks to be far from a championship contender. After finishing the second half of the season 30-11, the Heat decided to mostly bring the band back together, re-signing Dion Waiters and James Johnson to massive four-year contracts and using the remainder of their cap space on Kelly Olynyk. Waiters and Johnson were particularly baffling — neither had a semblance of a market the year before and money was much tighter across the league in 2017 than it was during the spending spree of 2016. Sure, both guys had improved their standing after a good 2016-17 campaign, but so much so that both required $50-plus million contracts?

Read More: What do teams do with non-shooters like Justise Winslow?

Add in Hassan Whiteside, Goran Dragic, Tyler Johnson and the recently-extended Josh Richardson, and the Heat have essentially no possibility of cap room until 2020:

How many of those players on non-minimum, non-rookie scale contracts would bring back a positive asset in a trade? Dragic and Richardson might be the only ones who are properly paid and could be the centerpiece of a trade to clear some money off their books, but they’re so far past the cap that multiple moves would be required to have significant space. The Heat are already $1.4 million away from the luxury tax threshold next season without Wayne Ellington, who is an unrestricted free agent at the end of this season. Ellington is a strong 3-point shooter and plays a significant role on the team, but is his presence worth paying the tax? This is the situation the Heat have put themselves in with their moves over the past few years.

Teams can trade away future first-round picks to acquire stars or even supporting players around a star they’ve developed. In the big picture, parting with a first to acquire Eric Bledsoe made sense for the Milwaukee Bucks because they already had a superstar in Giannis Antetokounmpo, and Bledsoe fit in a supporting role. Miami themselves gave up multiple first-round picks in the sign-and-trade to get James in 2010, an absolute no-brainer. The next time around, the Heat weren’t so lucky, and they’re going to pay for it. Riley traded two firsts again, using these future assets to acquire Goran Dragic, who was just 10 months removed from making an All-NBA team for the first time in his career. Those two firsts still haven’t conveyed to Phoenix, and Miami hasn’t had nearly the same success with Dragic that they had in the 10 years before Riley made that trade.

The Heat owe those two firsts to Phoenix, the first of which may convey in 2018, but they also owe every second-round pick from now until 2023, with the exception of 2022 (although at this rate, Riley won’t be holding on to that one for long). Prohibitively expensive teams live on draft picks; it’s the only way for them to bring in young, cost-controlled talent. Head coach Erik Spoelstra and his assistants have shown they can develop inexperienced players, but the Heat have continued to throw away chances to bring second-round flyers to the squad with which Spoelstra can work his magic.

At this point, the future in Miami rests almost entirely on Justise Winslow, whose foibles we covered a couple weeks ago, and rookie Bam Adebayo, who clashes with Whiteside at the center position but nonetheless looks like a quality player. The rest of the team is filled with solid but uninspiring veterans (Whiteside, Dragic, Waiters, James Johnson, Olynyk) or young guys who top out as solid role players (Tyler Johnson, Richardson), who will earn a combined $360 million between now and 2021.

Next: LeBron's path to the top goes through Houston

The scrappy Heat put together a historic finish to the season last year, but they’re going to be paying for it for years to come, as the stench of mediocrity overpowers the sweet smell of that 30-11 finish.