Miami's motion blur
1. Jimmy Butler and the Heat, cutting you to pieces
The post-LeBron James Miami Heat adapted to their superstar void by crafting a whirring motion offense designed to add up to more than the sum of its parts.
[I didn't know that.]
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...Kendrick Nunn, Tyler Herro, Duncan Robinson and even Dragic...None of those four can be the alpha dog of a good NBA offense, but they are... shifty screeners and movers, capable of letting fly after one or two dribbles if they catch the ball with some airspace -- the kind of head start Miami's motion is designed to generate.
[I didn't know that. That is really good stuff...Okay, wait a minute. Zach Lowe says the "Heat" "crafted" this post-LeBron. Well, it didn't work out the last three fucking years of 41-41. By consensus Zach Lowe is the most analytical basketball writer out there but I have had the fleeting sense previously that he puts a little too much agency into his analysis. That fleeting sense becomes concrete here. Hassan Whiteside was not signed to fit into any whirring motion offense; Whiteside was signed because he was an overlooked Big. Whiteside, Waiters, James Johnson, Tyler Johnson, Wayne Ellington were all picked as the best available off the scrap heap by a desperate management. As were Nunn, Herro, and Robinson. There wasn't any Vision of rustless bolts custom made for a whirring machine. They were signed/drafted because they could, like, make baskets. You know? Which the "Heat" pre-2019 and post-LeBron, like, couldn't. The NBA draft is, for reasons that escape me, a crap shoot and Pat Riley, Andy Elisburg, et al shot crap in 2015 with Justise Winslow, who could not shoot, at ten. Then last season they improvidently turned the "blur" offense over to a second round pick, Josh Richardson, who also couldn't shoot, which resulted in blurring motion the other way after Richardson clanks. They finally hit a pick at thirteen this year with Herro. Add Nunn and Robinson and Miami management hit an extremely rare trifecta. But that is all the agency there was: they went after shooters and got lucky, very lucky, for once. This "motion blur" offense was either not in place in previous seasons or if it was then it was brain death to attempt it with the Hassan-era personnel.]
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The Heat might not be quite as good as their gaudy 18-6 record; they have played an easy schedule and eked out close home wins this week against Washington, Chicago and Atlanta. But they are really good, and their players are amplifying each other.
