Nitro

A jumpshot is one of the few things that can realistically be added to one's repetoire, so I do think he has potential on that side of the ball. And with the way the league is right now, centers really aren't expected to do much offensively except finish around the basket and set strong picks. As it is Jordan is one of the better finishers in the league, and if he adds a decent jumper he'll be a major threat with Griffin as his frontcourt-mate.

Size is important. Anthony is smaller in height and weight than LeBron, and even though he is a great shotblocker, he does get exposed for it...any time KG or Dirk (PF's, mind you) would back him down in the playoffs, they bullied him around with ease. On the boards, he has terrible instincts and his size hurts him, with many big men simply reaching over him for the board even when Anthony does have position. This could be seen in the Chicago and Boston series', and I remember the worst game of the year with this was when the Jazz came back from a huge defecit and won with Milsap going for 46pts. His size also kills him around the rim as even when he does catch the ball (an issue for him), he has a ton of problems finishing around the rim unless he is completely wide open. Dalembert has his weaknesses, but he offers size, rebounding, defense and can actually finish around the rim. This offseason offers little in terms of centers who provide offense, and the ones who do like Gasol will be going for way more than the MLE. I think it'd be smarter to invest in a sure-thing who will fit in with Miami's system like Dalembert, and give Dexter Pittman the opportunity to develop and eventually get significant NBA minutes. Pittman actually does offer a solid post game, and is very good at finishing around the rim, so I think he could eventually be a key contributor if they develop him some more.

The Clips absolutely must lock this kid up. He has a ton of potential on both sides of the ball, and last season was a 10/10/2 on 69% shooting player as a starter, which already makes him one of the better centers in the league. In 2-3 years the Clips could have the best starting frontcourt in the league with him and Griffin.

http://www.nba.com/2010/news/06/28/kerr.tnt.ap/index.html There ya go.

Well, he does TNT games, so it's pretty obvious he's under contract with them...

It was for 'HIV Awareness Day' at Dwight's high school.

No, I said he'd be getting Juwan Howard minutes. K-Mart is not a better player than Bosh (who will be playing 35-40MPG), Spo loves Haslem who is arguably a better player than K-Mart and will see his 20-25MPG at the 4/5, and the Heat will most likely be getting a center this offseason, who will occupy 20-30MPG, with Anthony and Haslem/Bosh using the rest of those minutes at that spot. In other words, the only opportunities he will have to play are the same minutes Howard got this season (which were higher than usual since Haslem missed nearly the entire season).

This. I agree completely, it goes Wade/Kobe (whatever order you want to put them in), Manu, $JJ and then Ellis.

All of that's nice, but he's not a center, and he's 33 with multiple microfracture surgeries. The Heat already have 2 PF's who are better than he is, and they will likely spend the MLE (if there is one) on a true center or point guard. If he signs with the Heat for the minimum, he'll probably end up getting Juwan Howard minutes.

No, he was left with Caron Butler, Chucky Atkins and a few other role players. That year I give Kobe a pass since he was battling plantar faschiatis (sp?), but that was easily his worst season IMO, and it came at the worst time with Shaq gone and the rape stuff still lingering. His turnovers and shooting percentages, especially before Hamblen re-instated the triangle after Rudy T left, was pitiful.

I don't understand the fascination with Oden...he's played 82 games in 4 seasons, and only 21 in the last 2. He's had very, very serious surgeries, and was born with ailments that make him more succeptible to injury (I forget exactly what they were and too lazy to look them up). The Heat are not the kind of team that should spend their entire MLE on such a high-risk prospect. They should be spending their money on proven, durable talent. If they spend it on Oden and he goes down with injury, then they will be in the same boat they were this year, or even worse. And with Wade nearing 30 and this trio in their 2nd season together, they don't want to go another season ringless.

I think they deserve a chance to get help if they do [expletive] up on the drug test, and if they complete the treatment and pass the drug test they should have their benefits re-instated. If they get their welfair discontinued and don't receive the option of treatment, then it can potentially cause an abundance of other problems...increase in the homeless and other illegal activity to support themselves, for starters.

Awesome. No one deserved a title more than Kidd.. Can't wait to see his jersey retired at the Barclay's.

In no particular order... Cape Fear, Casino, Goodfellas, Heat, Taxi Driver.

LeBron is a MUCH better player than he was in 2007, specifically with his jumper. Besides fast breaks, he wasn't getting to the rim at all against Boston and Chicago...everything was jumpers. He's gotten a lot more comfortable with his perimeter game, and his defense is lightyears better than back in 2007. So, I do think he has shown the ability to improve his game in the off-season, and now that he's seen what he has to do for this team to be most successful, I think he'll work on those areas. I could be wrong, but I think he can and will to an extent. It's all about reaction. I think Spo threw in a few wrinkles as the series went on to beat the zone (as seen in Game 5 with the multiple open dunks around the rim for Haslem and Bosh, and then that play where LeBron went right to the middle of the zone and got the pass which led to an easy basket), but they never fully put it all together. The zone is a gimmick, and very few teams use it with any regularity hence why it can throw teams off who aren't prepared for it (like the Lakers last season when the Suns went to zone, but then they adjusted and had a lot of success). I think next season the Heat will be more prepared, and they have only a few select teams they have to worry about using an effective zone. I thought Wade was unstoppable in the post this series, but they didn't take advantage of it nearly enough, especially toward the end of the series. Wade can be that off-ball player, but he should also have substantial amounts of possessions where he is ball-dominant. LeBron too, however he really needs to work on his off-ball play. Neither of them are incapable of playing that way, and at times both showed a strong ability to play off-ball at times throughout the season...it's all a matter of getting comfortable with it. To me, that's on the coach. It's not something that can happen overnight, or thrown in during the middle of the series and expect to have success. It needs to start to begin in the offseason, then put into place in training camp, then practiced throughout the season. That was my biggest problem with Spo...he admitted to throwing in minimal offensive sets to start the season off, and didn't begin to expand this until mid-season. If he begins it from the get-go, and they gradually incorperate it, then the team will be well-prepared for the post-season.

1. Dirk 2. LeBron 3. Wade 4. Howard 5. Paul 6. Durant 7. Randolph 8. Pierce 9. Rose 10. Bryant A few of those guys could be switched around, but I think that's the 10.

I disagree. For a team that was built completely from scratch just 11 months ago, and half the team being on minimum deals, they were within 2 games from the NBA Finals, defeating the reigning EC champs, a 60+ win team, and losing to the team that swept the reigning 2x champs. They had a great shot at beating Dallas in their first 2 losses of the series, but simply weren't prepared for the zone and blew big 4th quarter leads as a result. That is a fixable mistake and something they have the personel to counter, it's just a matter of coaching and preparing them for those situations throughout the off-season, training camp, pre-season and reglar season, something that simply did not happen this year. There were a few times in the post-season where Wade was terrific moving off-ball and in the post (specifically in the Philly and Dallas series'), and I don't think they took enough advantage of that. Personel really wasn't the problem as much as making adjustments throughout a 7-game series was IMO. Joel Anthony is making like $3M a year and was extremely valuable at times for the Heat in the playoffs. Miller's deal is certainly managable, and Haslem's deal is terrific (he plays a lot of minutes at C which worked very well in the Chicago series, and worked in the Dallas series for the most part). None of those guys have deals as crippling as contracts like Fisher's, Artest's, Blake's, Walton's, Haywood's, Marion's, etc... Those guys are either really old with multiple years of near-MLE money left (Fisher, Walton, Artest), or are completely overpaid with multiple years left (Haywood, Marion, Blake). They were within 2 games of a championship after the entire roster being put together in one off-season. Now, after failing, these guys have a much better idea of what to improve on in the off-season, from the coaches down to the players. This year's team had the personel to win...what killed them was not being prepared. Now they know what to expect, and have an entire off-season and another regular season to learn from it and practice how to improve on what Dallas exposed.

He won't be fired, but I'm torn on whether he deserves to be fired...he really handled all the pressure that was placed on him very well throughout the season, and did get them to within 2 wins from an NBA championship. However, I think he is much more suited as an assistant as he simply has no idea how to coach an offense, and is often too late with making adjustments (and he was completely owned by Carslile after Carslile made a few great in-game adjustments that took Spo 1-2 games to react to). I'm really, really curious to see how a guy like Adelman, or even JVG would do with the Heat, but I don't know if you can reasonably fire someone for taking a completely reconstructed team to a near-title.

Completely different circumstances. Garnett was a far better rebounder and passer than McHale or Dirk ever were, has an MVP like Dirk (which McHale wasn't ever really close to), and has a DPOY which neither of those players have. Also, even though it's way overlooked in these debates, Garnett was probably the most versatile player in NBA history...could run an offense out of the post or at the top of the key (not extremely well for the latter, but he could still do it sufficiently), could score in face-ups or post-ups, was arguably the best rebounder in the league at one point, and could legitimately defend all 5 positions when he was in his prime. He wasn't a great 1st scoring option, but everything else he did much better than Dirk and McHale.

I agree, I am really curious to see how LeBron comes back next season. If he does the sensible thing and analyzes his weaknesses that were exposed against Dallas, I think he can come back better than ever. However, if he is content with how he performed in the Finals, then I'd be a little concerned...he can't fall into the trap of thinking he is good enough and won't continue to try to improve like he did each and every season before this year. I don't think the Heat will have much issue getting over what happened this year, however. Even though a lot of people expected them to win this season, a lot also didn't think they'd get past Boston. No team has ever literally been built from scratch like this team was, so getting to within 2 games of a championship and losing to a team that swept the reigning 2x champs is not a failure (even though it seemed that way). Once they have a little time to settle down and really evaluate how this season went (especially Spo who has the chance to seriously improve this team by making simple adjustments), I think they have a great chance to be significantly better next season, even with minimal personel upgrades.

My point was that if there is a hard cap, Miami will not be the only team screwed...Dallas is currently $25M over the cap (which the owners want to reduce to $45 million I believe), the Lakers are $32M over the cap, Chicago will be well over the cap once it's time to resign Rose, etc... Currently the Heat are only $8M over the cap, and they got all their main players on discount deals (Wade, Bron, Bosh, Haslem and Miller all came for cheap). So, if there is a hard cap put in place, they won't be as bad off as people are making it out to be because every other team will have the same problem....specifically teams with hugely overpaid role players like the Mavs have.

Dalembert offers size and rebounding, the two areas Anthony is completely awful in. Pittman I think can be a nice project as he is a very good finisher and has some good post moves, but he's nothing more than a raw project. All those times Miami was getting crushed on the boards against Dallas by Chandler (which is what caused all those loose ball fouls in the 4th quarter in the games at Dallas) would be greatly reduced with Dalembert in the middle.

THANK YOU!!! He made watching Knicks games throughout the '00's bearable...he's the [expletive]ing man. Shaq? Meh, I don't think he'd be a good in-game commentator. It took Mark Jackson years on YES before getting that ESPN gig, where he still sucked but not as much as before. I'd love to see Shaq on the Inside the NBA crew, where he has less of a workload, has more freedom to say what he wants and has other hilarious people to talk basketball with.

Eh, you can say that about the Mavs, Lakers, Knicks and Magic as well, among other teams.

Only trade I'd entertain is LeBron for Dwight. Otherwise, hell no would I trade LeBron...he's the best player in the league. It's only the first season of this project, and they will likely attract a few valuable FA's this summer/next year's tradeline (possibly the MLE and a few veteran contracts, maybe a trade or two). Also, if LeBron/Wade/Riley are as smart as I think they are, they will work on making LeBron expand his post and off-ball game, and install a real offense which can counter a simple zone (which is something every NBA team should be able to take advantage of). Hopefully they will also add more sets with Wade in the post, where he completely dominated in the Philly and Dallas series'. This team can work...they went 8-2 against Chicago and Boston, with Chicago having homecourt. LeBron and Wade have the abilities to play off each other, it's just a matter of getting them comfortable with doing that when the other is dominating the ball. My biggest issue with Spo all season long was his refusal to install a real offense in training camp and pre-season (which he admitted to), and then letting talent simply dominate throughout the season. He did a good job, especially on the defensive end, but he didn't maximize what he had.