Miami avoids 16th loss in a row
Despite not being fully recovered from knee and shoulder surgeries, Wade has been playing out of his mind in an attempt to stop Riley from taking another in-season vacation the Heat from setting a new franchise record for consecutive losses. Of course, it didn’t hurt that the Heat were playing Indiana who was missing Jermaine O’Neal. Wade was all over the floor, shooting 3s, taking the ball to the hoop, making all kinds of shots against the Pacers defense. Truth be told, the same “defense” allowed Kirk Hinrich (who sucked so much this year he’s been getting offers to star in gay porn movies) to match his career high.
Wade finished with 35 points (12-20 FG, 2-5 from the 3p line), 8 reb, 4 ast, 1 stl, 1 blk and 3 TO. He was helped by Haslem (12 p on 6-11, 9 reb) and Dorell Wright (14 p on 7-11, 10 reb). Not helping much were Jason Williams (4 points on 2-9 in 36 minutes) and Ricky Davis (2 points on 1-7 in 27 minutes). At least Williams contributed 8 ast and 6 stl with just 1 TO. Ricky only contributed with some bad defense.
What is surprising is that Miami has been sucking so bad recently despite excellent play from Wade. He isn’t anywhere near 100% (and in fact Riley should sit him till he’s recovered and “fight” for a higher pick in the draft) and you can see that especially on D where he’s not as active. He’s also a step slow on offense too, but his talent enables him to still be able to score at a high rate. So if Wade is playing great even if injured, why is Miami so bad ?
Well, even if Wade has been spectacular on the offensive end, he had little help. Jason Williams is only making 38.3% of his FGA (and that isn’t even his worst season shooting percentage-wise). Williams manages to have a career worst in points scored at 9.1 per game. And that is despite playing over 31 minutes per game and Miami not having too many scorers on the team. And what would be a “who sucks” list without Ricky Davis ? It would be an incomplete list, that’s what it would be. Ricky is shooting only 43.4% from the floor, but that doesn’t seem to bother him or maybe make him pass the ball more often. He actually averages 2 assists LESS than he did last season. After all, he has a shooter’s mentality. Too bad he’s not really a shooter. With such contributors, no wonder the Heat are 3rd last in the league in point differential and last in points scored per game.
Unfortunately for them, is not only the offense that sucks. The defense is just as bad. There are very few teams that allow more points per 100 possessions than the Heat: Warriors (tied at 109), Grizzlies, Bucks, Wolves, Knicks and Kings (tied). The rebounding is also bad, as Miami is 5th worse in the league in rebounding differential and dead last in rebounds per game. The problems with defense and rebounding can be partially explained by the injury to Zo and Shaq taking his annual 30 games break. That left Mark Blount as the starting C, and he responded by not letting his height (7 feet) stand in his way to averaging 2.8 rebounds in almost 17 minutes per game. I think that statistically there are more chances of one person getting hit by lightning AND a meteor at the same time then Blount getting a rebound.
Looking at the bunch of misfits Riley has assembled you almost understand Shaq’s lack of interest in playing during the regular season. After all, he’s saving himself for the playoffs.
