JUST IN: According to Bill Simmons, the Miami Heat are still one of the most feared teams in the East

 

 

The Eastern Conference saw a lot of personnel movement throughout the offseason, but the Miami Heat mostly stayed put.

So, how did the Heat maintain their place among the top, according to Bill Simmons?

On his podcast, Simmons detailed why he believes the Miami Heat are a greater threat than the Milwaukee Bucks.

“[The Bucks] are not the East team I fear.” Miami is the East team I fear.”

He cited various reasons, the most obvious being the Heat’s coaching advantage with coach Erik Spoelstra. Adrian Griffin, the Bucks’ rookie head coach, is guiding a championship-or-bust group. Giannis Antetokounmpo and Damian Lillard are a fantastic combination, but superstar pairings are notorious for having growing pains.

“This is the deepest Miami team I think we’ve had during the Butler run,” he said.

With Bam Adebayo’s offensive improvement, Tyler Herro’s great start before the ankle injury, and Duncan Robinson’s revival, the club is already deep.

Then there’s rookie Jaime Jaquez, who, along with Kyle Lowry, Kevin Love, Caleb Martin, and Haywood Highsmith, has blown people away. This is a legitimate roster.

“Not only is he perfect for them [the Heat], but I also love him and despise the Heat,” Simmons said of youngster Jaime Jaquez.

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Bam Adebayo of the Miami Heat provides a cryptic injury report despite a nagging condition

 

 

Bam Adebayo of the Miami Heat is now sidelined with a hip injury that will keep him out for the foreseeable future. While it wasn’t first taken seriously, Adebayo told the reporters after practice Tuesday that he doesn’t know when he’ll be able to return, according to Barry Jackson of The Miami Herald.

“I have no idea,” Adebayp admitted. “Being on the sidelines is new to me.” When the team returns from Toronto, I will be re-evaluated. We’ll talk about it then.”

The Miami Heat star did reveal his level of activity since re-injuring his hip in last Thursday’s game against the Indiana Pacers. Adebayo was injured in the first half of the aforementioned Pacers game and did not return in the second.

“I haven’t started doing much basketball stuff, no contact,” Adebayo said. “Everything else I’ve been doing, shooting and stuff like that, has been fine. The best thing for it is rest. That’s what I’ve been trying to do these past couple of days. Very boring. But this is the process.”

Adebayo was in the midst of a career-best season where he was averaging a little more than 23 points and over 10 rebounds per game.

Last Saturday, Miami announced via their X (previously known as Twitter) account that Adebayo would not travel to Toronto for their next game against the Raptors and would be regarded “day-to-day” following that. His next chance would come on Friday, when the Heat return home to face the Cleveland Cavaliers, but the question for the organization is whether they want to hurry Adebayo back on the court if he isn’t 100 percent.

Again, this isn’t the first time the University of Kentucky product has missed a game because of a left hip contusion. If he keeps getting hit in the same spot, he’s prone to getting a worse injury in that area.

However, Adebayo sets the record straight as saying that the process has been “baby steps, haven’t gotten that far” per Jackson. When the star big-man originally got injured, Heat head coach Erik Spoelstra said after the game that it wasn’t serious and said Adebayo heals fast.

“It’s not, thankfully, something serious,” Spoelstra said. “It’s just you play competitive NBA basketball, you get hit, you’re jumping and you’re twisting, all that stuff. He heals fast, so we’ll continue to treat him and see where we are.”

These upcoming couple of games where Adebayo will be absent, the other big-men on the roster such as Kevin Love, Thomas Bryant, and Orlando Robinson will have to provide exceptional minutes. None of them can recreate the defensive presence and offense the star can, but each can produce to Spoelstra’s liking.

“This isn’t our first time, so we’re confident in our front-court depth.” It will appear slightly different, which is what we appreciate about our depth. “Everyone brings something a little bit different, and they’ve all proven that they can impact games and help us win,” Spoelstra told ClutchPoints. “The game that you know, bam, missed in Cleveland, we got some great front-court play from our bigs, and it might be different tonight.” These people were really little and appeared in some of their lineups. So we just need to figure it out and create an impact for as many minutes they have in that position.”

Robinson would be the best performer for the Heat as a big-man in the loss to Indiana Saturday as he scored 16 points and collected five rebounds in 29 minutes of action. After the game, he told the media that there is room for improvement and he’s working on other facets of his game.