Pat Riley: The Miami Heat will compete for the playoffs
By Wes Goldberg
Don’t expect the Miami Heat to tank any time soon.
The loss of Dwyane Wade has many wondering how good this Miami Heat team can be. With so many young players, it’s tempting to call this summer a rebuild. However, during his off-season press conference, team president Pat Riley said the Heat will compete for the playoffs. Clearly, he doesn’t view it as starting over.
“Our plan is to always compete for a playoff spot and I don’t think there’s any doubt we can do it (this season),” Riley said.
Riley is excited about the core of young players Miami has. Especially Justise Winslow, Josh Richardson, Tyler Johnson and Hassan Whiteside.
“Give me four guys their age in the league and let’s play a four-on-four game, and I think we’d have a pretty competitive four–whether their lottery picks or not. So we feel that we have a good base of young players. The next step is to see what they can do and to augment this team.”
With the departures of Luol Deng and Joe Johnson, Winslow, Riley said, is ready to start at small forward. As for Whiteside, he will have to take a leading role for the Heat this season.
“We feel like he’s worth the investment. You’ve all seen him play. We believe he’s an essential part of our team.”
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Of course, hanging over this season will be the absence of Dwyane Wade who, after 13 seasons in Miami, signed with the Chicago Bulls this summer.
“It’s not going to be the same without (Wade) but we will forge ahead. Dwyane is unique,” Riley said. “There will always be a key under the mat (for Dwyane), I just hope it doesn’t get too rusty. We will miss him.”
While Wade’s absence will pull at heart strings all season, it’s Chris Bosh’s playing future that will have more of an impact this season. With Bosh–one of the more versatile two-way players in the NBA–the Heat will have a much better chance to compete for the playoffs. Though it doesn’t sound like Riley and the Heat have a plan in place for Bosh just yet.
“It’s always fluid and it always has been. It’s a positive environment right now with Chris and his doctors,” Riley said. “I know he wants to play and we would be open to that. Let’s allow this process to move down the road and we’ll go from there.”
But even with Wade gone and Bosh’s uncertain future, Riley is confident in the group’s young core, the addition of new players on one-year contracts and, of course, in head coach Erik Spoelstra, who is the second-longest tenured coach in the league behind only Spurs legend Gregg Popovich. “He is competitive, excited and he knows the challenges ahead of him. His philosophy is ‘bring them to me and I’ll coach them.'”
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The future of the Heat has never been so murky and clear at the same time. There will be plenty of changes over the next few years, thought the Heat have a promising group of young players to build around. Still, no matter what, Riley’s goal is to make the playoffs. Once in the post-season, anything can happen from there.
“The process never changes. The faces do, but the train keeps rolling down the track. We’re looking forward to it.”