Comes now D-Wade, the greatest Heater of them all:😳
"It’s not that the talent is not there. I mean, them guys are very talented. It’s just the meshing of the talent is not there. ...
“And it’s not just about going out and getting a star player. I know the star player will get you back in there. But you’ll be out in the first round with that star player, if your players don’t mesh, and that connectivity isn’t there.
“And so we’ve been a little disorganized, a little disgruntled organization for the last few years.
"When it comes to this unit and these groups that’s been put together the last few years, it hasn’t meshed."
Is it Spo pulling the wrong strings? No.:
“Sometimes you see certain teams and you know that they know everything about each other. They spend all the time together, and they just connect it. And you can see it on the floor.
“I haven’t really seen that necessarily in the Heat in a while. And it started when everything started going astray with Jimmy and the Heat, and we’ve been a disconnected organization from that point."
And I remembered...
The players split on Jimmy. Jimmy had taken Nikola Jovic under his wing, did a TV commercial with 3J, talked up Tyler. Jimmy was the leader of those teams whatever that C said on Bam's jersey. Then Riley suspended him and suspended him and suspended him some more. Then Spo told Jimmy he wasn't starting and kicked him out of practice.
The players were tilted. What do you say? Who do you support, the org or Jimmy? Nikola remained loyal; Tyler turned on Jimmy. They were "disgruntled", "disconnected." The team lost 10 or 11 straight after the trade. I didn't get the sense that the players "spend all their time together". They righted themselves and won their play-in against Atlanta. Spo has recounted many times that plane ride from Atlanta to Cleveland for the beginning of the playoffs. 35,000 feet up the clouds seemed to him to have parted. The sky was blue.
Then Cleveland blew them out of the sky
Spo had misread the atmosphere.
He fought all summer long with Kel'el Ware, a well-meaning, vulnerable young man who was really trying; said Kel'el lacked "professionalism". During the regular season, too. Paired him with Bam as a starter. Then yanked him. Banished to the bench, then reinserted him as a starter. Up and down the yo-yo went. Said that a young player like Kel'el sometimes subconsciously withholds effort to convince the coach to play him more. Spo had to walk that one back when D-Wade and Udonis Haslem defended Kel'el. Players don't like when one of their own is accused by the head coach of sabotaging the team.
It seemed to me at times this season that the disconnect between org and the players was still there. Hell, even Bam was disgruntled. I wrote that the players seemed to have lost "belief". When a game started going south, the body language was a tell.
So, Dwyane Wade opened my eyes to the "disconnect" in this roster, and he reminded me of its source in the Jimmy Butler trauma. He is absolutely correct.
But I fundamentally, vehemently disagree with him that the talent is there on this roster. These players could be connected at the hips and giving each other love bites, they're just not good enough.
