The Indiana Pacers are the Miami Heat’s biggest threat in the East

The Eastern Conference is up for grabs, so who will be the Miami Heat’s biggest competition?

When thinking about the Eastern Conference, the sexy names on everyone’s mind are usually the Toronto Raptors, the Boston Celtics, and the Philadelphia 76ers.

Those three teams are the supposed powerhouses of the conference, after LeBron James has left for the Los Angeles Lakers.

But when it comes specifically to the Miami Heat, I have a different belief.

The Heat aren’t going to threaten for the Eastern Conference crown this year; and if you’re a realist, you’ve accepted it already. That means the ‘biggest threat’ has to go beyond the 2018-19 season.

I’m here to tell you that the Indiana Pacers are the biggest threat to the Miami Heat, this season and onwards.

And I have three reasons why this makes sense:

• They’re a young team
• They’re already good
• They have major cap space in the coming years

When looking up and down the Pacers’ roster, you realize that a majority of their players are on the right side of the careers and have plenty of room to grow. The oldest player on the roster is point guard Darren Collison at 31, and he’s one of two players on the team that is 30 years or older.

Let’s look at their top scorers last year, who are still on the team:

Victor Oladipo (age 26)

Bojan Bogdanovic (age 29)

Myles Turner (age 22)

These three guys led the team in scoring, with Turner being second on the team in rebounding and Oladipo being second on the team in assists.

Comparing that to the Heat roster, RealGM did an analysis on each roster’s average age and how they acquired the players they have.

Without the re-signing of Udonis Haslem, the average age of the Miami Heat roster is 26.2 years. Meanwhile, the Pacers have an average age of 25.4 years.

Looking at the rest of the league, this would leave the Pacers tied at sixth youngest and the Heat in the middle of the pack at 17th youngest. (However, take this stat with a grain of salt, as it does include the 18-man rosters which typically skew to signing more young players.)

Fans usually equate a young roster to a struggling team.

But the Pacers have already proven that they are able to compete in the Eastern Conference with a 48-34 record in the 2017-18 season. This record was good enough to award them with the fifth seed.

This was with James ruling the conference. And they had their shot to dethrone the King in the playoffs, and were up to the task.

Taking James and the Cleveland Cavaliers to seven games in the first round of the playoffs is a mighty task (ask the Raptors).

The most promising thing to me about the Pacers in that series is that they didn’t waver. They had the lead twice on the Cavaliers (1-0 and 2-1) and even went down 3-2, but were strong enough to force a Game 7.

Losing by four points in a Game 7 on the road against arguably the best player in the history of the game, isn’t something to scoff at.

With LeBron James taking his talents to the Western Conference and the addition of Tyreke Evans, Kyle O’Quinn and Doug McDermott this offseason, the Pacers have the potential to go farther in the regular season and the playoffs.

And their success can extend beyond this upcoming season.

The Pacers have Darren Collison, Cory Joseph, Tyreke Evans, Thaddeus Young, Bogdanovic, and O’Quinn coming off the books this year.

While I can see them re-signing a couple of those players, that’s a lot of cap space emptying up.

With Oladipo signed through 2020-21 at $21 million a year and Turner facing restricted free agency next offseason, the Pacers have the potential to make some noise in the market.

This is perhaps the biggest reason I see them as a threat to the Heat. With the Heat’s current cap situation, they’ll only be able to make major splashes upon shedding those contracts in the coming seasons.

If the Pacers continue developing their team and have boatloads of cap space available to make a run at big free agents, what exactly are the Heat going to be able to offer? Other than the locale of South Beach?

The answer to that question lies heavily in the development of Josh Richardson, Bam Adebayo and Justise Winslow. If they are able to carry the team to similar heights as the Pacers and the team success falls predominantly on their shoulders, then there’s an argument to be made.

But until then, the Pacers are going to be one dangerous team for the Heat.