Nylon Calculus: Playing real or fake with early season NBA trends
2. Miami Heat as a contender: Real or fake?
The East is rather ugly so far this season. Milwaukee, the NBA and conference’s defending champion, has been plagued by injuries and lost time due to COVID protocols. Brooklyn, who’s without a third of its offensive thread-headed dog, is still finding its identity under the assumption Kyrie Irving doesn’t return. Chicago has impressed, New York has met expectations, and Washington has been the feel-good story of the season so far.
And then there’s Miami, consistently competing on both ends of the floor in a non-glamorous style that’s eerily similar to the San Antonio teams that dominated at the start of the century.
The Heat and the top-seeded Warriors are the only two teams that are top-5 in both offense and defense. Miami’s success has come from a simple strategy to optimize second-chance opportunities and attempts at the free-throw line while limiting uncontested opponent opportunities from the field.
They’ve followed the mold of recent dominant defensive teams in allowing opponents to shoot from outside as they please while walling off the paint. Miami opponents take a greater percentage of their shots as above-the-break 3-point attempts than those at the rim, which is consistent with their profile for each of the last two seasons.
The addition of Kyle Lowry has made the defense all the more stellar. With him in the lineup, opponents take 25 percent of their attempts at the rim, which would rank as the league’s stingiest rim defense.
Based on the personnel and the recent success of the franchise, it’s natural to expect that Miami’s prowess is real.
The Heat have compiled a diversified shot profile thus far, indicating that they have legitimate potential on that end of the floor. They generate easy opportunities off of putbacks, as well as in transition off of live turnovers and rebounds.
The core offensive talent for this team — chiefly Jimmy Butler and Tyler Herro — have been among the most efficient scorers at their respective positions. Max Strus, a two-way addition last season who signed a non-guaranteed contract with the Heat this summer, has shot the ball deftly so far.
Neither Duncan Robinson nor Bam Adebayo has hit their stride yet with sub-average efficiencies across the floor; Adebayo is shooting 70 percent at the rim and Robinson 33 percent on 3-point attempts.
As a result, bench units that feature Strus, Markieff Morris, and P.J. Tucker in place of Robinson and Adebayo have generated better offensive success than their starting group. The Heat have enough depth to sustain a seven-game battle in May against a top conference foe.
All signs indicate that the Heat will continue to improve and succeed as the season progresses. The expectation is that Robinson and Adebayo find the efficiency we’ve become accustomed to seeing over the past two seasons and that Miami’s starting group becomes even more dominant.