Why Miami Heat Should Explore Potential Luol Deng Trade

Luol Deng has been a pleasant surprise for the Miami Heat. He’s been so good, in fact, that he might be playing his way out of town.

The 6’9” forward had a frustrating 2013-14. He regressed statistically and was traded to the Cleveland Cavaliers from the Chicago Bulls—a winning situation to a dumpster fire, basically—after the latter lost confidence in their ability to ink him to a long-term deal. And then short contracts were all that came for him this summer.

But after signing a two-year, $20 million dollar deal to replace the departed LeBron James, the Sudanese forward has bounced back for Miami. Per Basketball-Reference.com, the 29-year-old leads the Heat in minutes played, is second in win shares and leads Heat regulars with usage rates over 15 percent in true shooting percentage.

His efficiency from the floor is the primary driver of his productivity this season. Deng’s true shooting percentage of 58 is the highest in his career by a significant margin, is 5.3 percentage points above his career average and represents a 6.3 percentage-point improvement over what he offered a season ago.

The principle cause of this shooting uptick is…well, everything. Deng, according to Basketball-Reference.com, has seen better shooting in 2014-15 than he has been across his career in every discrete location on the floor.

He’s knocking down 67.2 percent of shots within three feet, up from 63.9 percent. He’s at 44.1 percent from 3-10 feet, an improvement from 38.6. He’s hitting 46.4 percent of his 10- to 16-foot shots, 40.5 from 16-23 and 36.4 percent from beyond the arc, all significantly better than his 35.2, 39.9 and 33.2 percent career averages.

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This is in part due to Miami's employing Deng as the principle in "floppy" plays. NBA.com's Cooper Mourhead provides a nice breakdown here:

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Without getting too nitty gritty, floppy is a common NBA set which gives a player multiple options off of a variety of baseline screens. The HEAT went away from it once Spoelstra introduced the pace-and-space offense during the 2011-12 season, but it was always a part of their playbook.

They would use it most notably when Dwyane Wade was running with units while both James and Chris Bosh rested. Remember those possessions where Wade would curl off some low picks and rise up for an elbow-jumper? That was floppy.

"

So "floppy," has, in part, made Deng's game tighter, and a player whose lone area of real weakness across his career has been scoring efficiency has suddenly become a very efficient scorer. Teams have noticed. And they’ve come calling.

According to the South Florida Sun-Sentinel’s Ira Winderman, Miami has already rebuffed the Memphis Grizzlies offer for Deng—who, with his defensive prowess, would be a great fit schematically and ideologically in the Grizzlies’ grit-and-grind system. (Memphis has likely moved on from Deng after acquiring Jeff Green.)

While it's difficult to discern signal from noise in the NBA's busy rumor mill, there are some logical landing spots left out there for Luol.

The Atlanta Hawks have a top-five defense and, according to USA Today's Sam Amick, prepared an offer for the forward this offseason.

The Los Angeles Lakers are also, as Lake Show Life's Scott Asai argued, a contender for his services. They've long coveted Deng, and could offer Jordan Hill, a stellar rebounder who would fortify that persistent Heat weakness. 

Miami, in fact, has a lot to gain from moving on from the forward.

We’ll start with the smaller, and less likely, incentive.

The Heat are not—repeat, are not—a team that tanks. But with South Beach barely in the Eastern Conference playoff race, it might make more sense to take a step back and accept a trip to the lottery—and the star that could come with it—than suffer a postseason one-and-done.

The Heat are in the business of winning championships, and for a program with that ambition, missing out on the 2015 playoffs might be the better-value play.

(That said, “value” for Miami ownership also means actual revenue. And teams, because big-player contracts only cover the regular season, only pay their players a—comparatively—small per diem during the playoffs. That is, owners pocket the ticket revenue. The lesson: It’s good to be a sports owner.)

More importantly, though, by moving on from Deng’s salary, then making a couple of subsequent moves to free up more dollars, Miami could put itself in a position to fast-track its sprint back into contention.

The Heat have long been pegged as big players in the summer of 2016—when Kevin Durant, Chris Paul and Dwight Howard could all be had—but it might make more sense for the franchise to make an initial push this offseason.

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For starters, both Jimmy Butler and Kawhi Leonard will be available. Both are rising stars—arguably stars who have already risen—and both restricted free agents are significantly younger than the bigger names waiting in 2016. Even in a league that’s trending toward shorter contracts, that matters.

Snagging either Butler or Leonard would also, it seems, strengthen Miami’s pitch to one of the stars of 2016. In a league where winning—and respect—are the real currency (if only because artificial caps on individual player salaries limit the amount teams can pay top-end talent), having two stars on board makes Miami a more attractive destination than a city with one.

The primary hitch to this plan though—Operation Butler/Leonard—is that the Heat can’t afford it, not currently, at least.

While Miami has no salary obligations in 2016-17, save those to Chris Bosh and Josh McRoberts, they’re on the hook for roughly $69 million next season, according to HoopsHype.com. In other words, in order to make a play for a star this summer, they need to shed salary. And Deng, and his $10 million 2015-16 player option, is a good place to start.

It’d be hard to lose Deng. He’s a fine player and by all accounts a better man. But that’s life in the modern NBA: Sometimes, to take two steps forward, you have to take one step back.