Which Reclamation Project Is Most Critical to Miami Heat's Success?
For the past four years, Miami Heat head coach Erik Spoelstra’s most important job was in compelling LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh to play to their respective superstar potentials.
In other words, getting them to be who they are.
This time around, the challenge couldn’t be more different: helping players like Luol Deng, Josh McRoberts and Danny Granger be better than they’ve been—at least recently.
So which stands to be Spoelstra’s most daunting reclamation project?
Ain’t No Deng
Of the three, Deng arrives with by far the most proven pedigree: a pair of All-Star appearances, one All-NBA Defense second-team nod and a string of successful seasons as a member of the Derrick Rose-led Chicago Bulls.
Facing the prospect of having to spend beaucoup bucks to keep Deng in Chicago, the Bulls chose instead to deal the veteran small forward just 23 games into the 2013-14 regular season.
Landing with Kyrie Irving and the Cleveland Cavaliers, Deng struggled to find a consistent rhythm, putting up career lows (or near-career lows) in points per 36 (15.2), field-goal percentage (42 percent) and player efficiency (14) over 40 games.
Now, after inking a two-year, $20 million deal to join the Heat, Deng faces arguably his biggest challenge to date: following in the footsteps of the best basketball player on the planet.
Replacing takes it entirely too far, of course, in that James’ talents simply cannot be duplicated. Still, as a top-tier wing defender with decent scoring and playmaking abilities, Deng at least gives Spoelstra a respectable LeBron analog.
To his credit, Deng is doing everything in his power to skirt that conversation entirely. From a recent interview with the South Florida Sun-Sentinel’s Shandel Richardson:
"I never said, 'You know what, LeBron is gone, let me try to go and be his replacement.' That never entered my mind at all. I thought about the organization, what's best for me and how I could be better. I'm here, but whatever team I would have ended on, I would have just focused on being the best I could be and how I'm going to help the team. I'm not trying to be anybody's replacement, trying to be anybody that I'm not. I've just got to be the best Luol Deng that I've got to be.
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At 29 years old, Deng is, by all accounts, squarely in the prime of his career. It may take a while to be rid of the Cleveland demons, but when he is, Deng’s versatility is bound to resurface.
Granger Danger
Three years ago, Deng vs. Granger would’ve made for an intriguing fantasy debate indeed. But after suffering a slew of injuries and setbacks during his final few years with the Indiana Pacers, Granger—the writing of Paul George’s ascendance all but on the wall—was finally deemed expendable.
After a year spent riding the fringes of Doc Rivers’ rotation with the Los Angeles Clippers, Granger accepted Miami’s offer of two years, $4.2 million. Granger’s primary motivation: Spoelstra’s pass-happy offensive system.
“I studied how hard it is to guard the three-point line when they’re moving the ball and spacing and everybody’s touching the ball,” Granger recently told NBA.com. “It’s a very difficult offense to guard so now that I’m in it, I’m trying to learn it and hopefully I’ll be very efficient in it.”
As things stand, Granger will likely be jostling for backup minutes with fellow swingmen Shawne Williams, Shannon Brown and Reggie Williams. If healthy, however, Granger gives the Heat something the rest of them don’t: a deadeye scorer capable of taking ultimate advantage of Spoelstra’s space-heavy schemes.
If healthy being scribbled in sizeable italics.
"In a best-case scenario, Granger would start against power forwards who don't post up, he'd hit open 3s, and he'd spend stretches defending some star wings to help LeBron and Wade save energy," Grantland's Zach Lowe wrote shortly after the Granger signing but before James' departure. "In a worst-case scenario, he's done."
With Deng in the fold, Granger becomes more of a risk-reward luxury than a necessary cog. That designation, as it turns out, belongs to another of Miami’s free-agent pickups.
Not Joshing Around
Playing alongside Al Jefferson in the Charlotte frontcourt last season, McRoberts authored something of a breakout year in what’s otherwise been a decidedly middling career.
McRoberts has always been a decent shooter from downtown. But it was through the 6’10” big man’s passing—reflected in a career-high 21.9 percent assist rate—that McRoberts emerged as one of Charlotte’s most sneakily effective playmakers.
That should prove an immediate and lasting boon for the Heat, looking as they are to at least approximate James’ uncanny vision and unselfishness.
But while Deng faces the unenviable task of filling LeBron’s sizeable shoes at both ends of the floor, McRoberts, writes Bleacher Report’s Zach Buckley, has a much more manageable target in front of him, albeit a rotationally crucial one:
"Between McRoberts' decision-making and three-point range, Heat fans may see some of the same elements that the recently retired Shane Battier brought to the court. McRoberts isn't the defender Battier once was, but the 27-year-old is an upgrade in terms of playmaking and athleticism.
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At just 26 and freshly signed to a four-year, $23 million deal, McRoberts isn’t a reclamation project so much as a work in progress—once a surefire bust, lately a more-than-serviceable rotation player, now a crucial key to Spoelstra’s goal of maintaining his team’s high-octane offense.
From Patchwork to Playoff-Ready
Having watched the game’s greatest player take his talents back home, the Heat could’ve just as easily resigned themselves to a year or two of lottery largesse and free-agent targets. Instead, Spoelstra and team president Pat Riley battened down the rotational hatches to somehow emerge—scarred but hardly slain—at the other end.
Be their curse physical, psychological or circumstantial, all three of Deng, McRoberts and Granger are, to varying degrees, reclamation projects. But it’s Deng—with his refined two-way game and still-salvageable All-Star pedigree—who remains the single biggest X-factor of Miami’s post-LeBron prospects.
James leaving you behind, like the otherworldly lover that got away, is something you never get over. Getting through it, though, is something Deng and the Heat are looking to show isn't just a coping mechanism, but a successful basketball strategy as well.
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