All the attention will be placed on James defying gravity, but there won’t be any perspective as to how that fastbreak developed. What so many fail to notice about the play is that it came as a direct result of the Heat’s defense; namely Joel Anthony’s defense. The 6’9″ shot-blocker came from out-of-nowhere to block the close-range shot of Louis Williams and, most importantly, keeping the ball inbounds.

It’s been said over the past three years over and over again: the Heat are at their best when the defense can create offense. When the Heat are forcing turnovers and initiating fastbreaks, they are at their most unstoppable point because of how fast, athletic and unselfish the Heat can be when running a fastbreak. In this particular instance, it was Norris Cole who was unselfish enough to get the ball to James.

All coming as a result of the Heat’s main deterrent at the rim: an undersized center who has barely seen minutes this year because of his offensive shortcomings. Now that the Heat are slowly but surely realizing that they need someone who can affect shots at the rim, Anthony is beginning to return to the rotation. Miami was growing weary of giving up 100+ points to teams like the Kyrie Irving-less Cleveland Cavaliers or the John Wall-less Washington Wizards.

Needless to say, they made the right choice and it’s paying off. Anthony’s influence is being felt and the Heat are starting to take notice, thus the reason why Joel played a season-high 18 minutes in the Heat’s win over a hot Atlanta team. Anthony only had two points on one field-goal attempt, but his two blocks and two steals, as well as the number of shots he affected at the rim with his presence, forced Atlanta to second-guess their shot selection.

As a result, the Hawks ended up taking 28 three-pointers; five more than their usual average of three-point attempts per game.

Joel was a +9 against  Atlanta and a +10 in 14 minutes against New Orleans, where he recorded three blocks, three rebounds and one steal. What a coincidence that the Heat allowed 92 and 90 points respectively in the two games where Anthony has garnered his most minutes this season. It was the first time since the middle of November that the Heat had allowed less than 100 points in back-to-back games.

You can take the Hornets game with a grain of salt, but yielding only 92 points to a surging and motivated Hawks team is impressive no matter how you try to put it.

The Heat are returning to their defensive identity as a team that can run you out of the building on both sides of the ball, yet they’re doing so while also keeping the flow of the offense moving as fluidly as it has in the ‘Big Three’ era. Even more impressive is the fact that they’re doing so with Joel on the floor. While I’m not one to agree when the team decides to run an ineffective pick-and-roll with him, it is truly a beautiful sight to see the talent of LeBron James overshadowing the essential loss of a fifth player on the offensive end.

And do the Heat have better options at this point? Rashard Lewis and Udonis Haslem aren’t providing much on either end, with the exception of Haslem’s rebounding. Shane Battier could find himself back in the starting role thanks to his ability to stretch the floor and still play effective defense against those much larger than him, but he’s not going to provide the shot-blocking that Anthony provides and this team needs.

While Anthony does provide the shot-blocking the Heat so desperately needs, he may find himself in a better situation coming off the bench. If he’s implemented in the starting lineup, he runs a higher risk of getting into foul trouble, while also obstructing the team’s attempts at creating an offensive rhythm early on.

When he comes off the bench, he’ll be fresh and will feature a new dimension to the Heat defense; one that includes a premier shot-blocker. The opposition’s second unit will be forced into taking long jumpers because of Anthony’s influence around the rim, leading to the opponent taking inconsistent shots in low-percentage areas. Having Anthony on the floor against the second unit will allow the Heat to weather the storm with either James out or him being the only superstar on the floor.

Perhaps his most redeeming value comes in the form of his activity along the perimeter. While his perimeter defense has never been regarded as world-class, he’s a huge eyesore to point guards coming off the pick-and-roll. Anthony’s lengthy arms cause point guards to second guess their pass because of the risk of Joel creating a deflection that would end up leading to one of those oh-so-dangerous Heat fastbreaks.

That’s what Joel Anthony does on the court: he makes you think twice about everything you do. If you want to take a layup, you have to think about the shot-blocker who’s garnering 4.1 blocks per 36 minutes. Want to run a pick-and-roll? Tough to do when Anthony is frantically waving his arms in front of your face, before racing back to his original man and eliminating any threat of a successful pick-and-roll.

Outside of LeBron James, nobody can cover the floor on the defensive end like Anthony. He’s capable of causing deflections at the top of the perimeter and can block any shot that comes his way because he has no fear of getting dunked on. As strange as it might be to say, Joel Anthony is the player that’s going to turn everything around for the Heat.

“But the Heat won a championship without him, why do they need him now”, is what you’re probably asking. The Heat didn’t beat the Thunder directly because of their small lineup; they won because LeBron James is incredible, Shane Battier was disgustingly wonderful from beyond the arc, and they caused a great deal of mismatches between people like Battier going against Serge Ibaka and Chris Bosh going against Kendrick Perkins.

Against Indiana? LeBron and Dwyane became unstoppable, and Roy Hibbert wasn’t aggressive enough to get the ball. Against Boston? You can thank LeBron James for his incredible Game 6 and Chris Bosh for the most underrated Game 7 performance in recent NBA history.

If the Heat want to see consistent success, however, they need to have some form of defense at the rim. No capable guard or forward is going to be worried when they drive in on Chris Bosh or Rashard Lewis. They will be worried, though, when they see one of the league’s top shot-blockers hanging out near the rim. The fact that they second-guessed for a mere second means that the Heat have already won that defensive possession by forcing their opponent into a shot they didn’t want to take.

The signing of Ray Allen definitely points the Miami Heat towards "Winning" in the offseason.

When there isn’t any basketball to watch and analyze, journalists are forced to go to option B, covering the NBA offseason movement.

The last few summers haven’t disappointed at all. LeBron James made the “Decision”. Dwayne Wade stayed in the NBA city that he has developed into a household name. Kevin Durant made post-modern history by not making a skeptical out of his contract extension by simply mentioning it on Twitter.

The summer of 2012 wasn’t as predominantly awesome as 2012 with the resigning of Wade, James taking his talents to South Beach for the first time and Chris Bosh hoping in his carry-on bag, but adding Ray Allen — no matter how old the man is, he will always be able to shoot the rock — never hurt anyone.

If a general manager or franchise owner then throws in a Rashard Lewis to reunite Allen and Lewis from their days in Seattle like the Heat front brass did, I’d say there is no reason at all to say the Heat didn’t win this offseason.

Rashard Lewis leaves a bad situation with the Washington Wizards for a winning one with the Miami Heat.

Let’s face it James, Wade and Bosh are not making small change. With three players making as much money as they are ($52,114,000 of the team’s $82,629,170 payroll for the 2012-13 season), it is almost impossible to build a team around them.

We seen the problems or issues of this very situation last season. Bosh was uncertain with his role and the other two superstars couldn’t beat the Dallas Mavericks in the 2011 NBA Finals by themselves. They needed help.

This past season, they still needed offensive help — Mario Chalmers, Shane Battier and Mike Miller came up huge in the playoffs but struggled to stay consistent in the regular season — but Miami managed to add some defensive stoppers to the team. The aged knees of Zydrunas Ilgauskas and Erick Dampier were replaced by a great interior defender in Joel Anthony; although, he was useless on the other side of the ball.

Battier improved defense on the wing and a healthy Udonis Haslem made for mass improvement for upfront depth and rebounding.

On the other hand, the Heat didn’t have much scoring at all.

Now Allen and Lewis add two lethal snipers from the perimeter, who will make any Miami ball carrier’s eyes light up when they see these two on the other end of their pass. Both of these guys can score 15-plus points on any given night. Besides James, Wade and Bosh, Miami hasn’t had anyone else who can fill up the net like these two can.

No one can deny the scoring ability of Dwyane Wade, Chris Bosh and LeBron James.

Lewis has dropped off from his three consecutive seasons of 20-plus points per game when he was with the Seattle Super Sonics, but his is still a legitimate threat. He isn’t going to be an All-Star on the Heat because that isn’t his role anymore. The Washington Wizards asked him to do too much with a squad with too little. The young players had talent, but no heart, no drive and no discipline what so ever.

There are only a few guys in the NBA I would expect to thrive in this situation — Tim Duncan, Kobe Bryant and James. If you didn’t notice, these are three of the best players to ever play in the league; far advanced from Lewis’ level of a solid player.

If the Miami Heat won a ring without much offense coming from outside the three superstars, then I don’t see why they couldn’t or shouldn’t repeat with them.

Not only can these guys shoot, but Allen is a clutch shooter who looks a buzzer-beater in the face without blinking and Lewis is a lengthy defender who can handle the ball and grab five or six boards a game.

I have no problem saying the Heat are the biggest winners of the offseason. They got two prime time scores who will help in other areas and will still have one of the best defenses in the league.

Also, who do they have to contend with?

Old Man Winter better known as Steve Nash joined the already aged Los Angeles Lakers.

The Los Angeles Lakers picked up a fossil in Steve Nash for four draft picks, including two first round selections. Nash is great and Kobe Bryant is 1B behind Michael Jordan when it comes to the best guards of all-time, but the Lakers are old and are not going to maintain a high level of play if Pau Gasol loses his edge — like he does midway through every other season — or Bynum does something stupid.

Plus, LA’s bench is still awful.

The New York Knicks signed Jason Kidd, also super old, and Raymond Felton, who is over weight and doesn’t seem to want to be in the NBA at times.

Houston over spent on potential in Jeremy Lin and Omer Asik. If these two don’t pan out, neither do the Rockets.

The Nets made some key moves by resigning Deron Williams and Gerald Wallace while trading for Joe Johnson. I’m a fan of all three of these guys and think them plus Brook Lopez is a solid four. They will be in the playoffs and could even be a contender for a championship.

However, their bench is weak after MarShon Brooks and would get rolled in a seven-game series against the Heat or a Chicago Bulls team with a healthy Derrick Rose, even though they haven’t done anything other than let last years deep roster thin.

Miami has done a great job of not only enticing players to come to South Beach, but to sign on the dotted line as well. The Heat’s ability to get it done in the offseason will only transfer to impressive achievements such as a second consecutive NBA Championship.