The 19-18 Miami Heat are sitting comfortably as the 6th seed in the Eastern Conference, hoping to continue their uptrend over the past few weeks winning 8 out of their last 10 games. However, they may have some roster decisions to make fairly soon.
As the Miami Heat are looking to continue down the right direction in the Eastern Conference, the February 7th trade deadline is right around the corner and the Heat may have a few decisions to make.
Miami has their current roster fairly locked up for the next few seasons, but there are a couple players who may lose some important minutes fairly soon due to Dion Waiters coming back a few games ago. And while Waiters’ minutes will be inconsistent over the next few weeks, he’ll most definitely be an important cog of Miami’s basketball machine going into the – hopeful – playoffs.
Head coach Erik Spoelstra isn’t necessarily looking to play more than a 9 or 10 man lineup heading into the playoffs, so let’s look at how the team will potentially be set up moving into the postseason without a trade.
Potential Starters:
- PG, Goran Dragic (still injured)
- SG, Dion Waiters
- SF, Josh Richardson
- PF, James Johnson
- C, Hassan Whiteside
Potential Bench:
- PG, Justise Winslow
- SG, Dwyane Wade (1-year)
- PF, Kelly Olynyk
- C, Bam Adebayo
- SF, Rodney McGruder (1-year/Team Option)
- PG, Tyler Johnson
- SF, Derrick Jones Jr.
- SG, Wayne Ellington (1-year)
- PF, Udonis Haslem (1-year)
Obviously, the Heat can just enter the playoffs with the depth in their roster above, but there are some potential moves to be made if they want to secure some assets by trading players that could potentially leave Miami during the summer of 2019.
When middling teams such as the Heat are getting closer to surpassing basketball purgatory in the middle of the pact, the reoccurring move for these type of organizations is to trade a player with 1-year left on their contract because of the fear they’d leave in the summer or simply because they don’t need that player anymore.
Therefore, by looking at Miami’s 1-year contract players, there are a few that aren’t moving no matter what because all of South Florida would revolt. These two players will one day have their jerseys hung from American Airlines’ rafters, and they are obviously Dwyane Wade and Udonis Haslem, both of whom are Heat legends and one of them (Wade) is a perennial hall of fame talent.
As for the other 1-year deal players, Rodney McGruder and Wayne Ellington, both of those solid contributors can potentially be dealt before the trade deadline without much changing from the Heat roster, so let’s dissect that idea.
McGruder, even with his minutes dropping over the past 15-20 games, has still been extremely efficient and productive on both ends for Miami, tied for the most starts by a Heat player this season with Josh Richardson (36 games started). So even though McGruder wouldn’t hurt this roster too much on paper by trading the 27-year-old wing for another asset, his role with the Heat has bolstered the amazing chemistry that the team has had over the past few weeks.
As for Ellington, there is a case to be made that the 3-point sniper wing can be sold to a contending team around the league for a solid package in return (player and pick). Ellington has only played in 5 games in over a month for the Heat and has only totaled 15+ minutes in one of those games. However, if the Heat sold on “The Man with the Golden Arm,” they wouldn’t necessarily be selling low on him, as he’s shown glimpses of the type of player he was last season this year.
Albeit, the basic numbers on paper aren’t fantastic:
2017-18 stats (77 games in 26.3 MPG): 11.2 PPG – shooting splits 40.7/39.2/85.9
2018-19 stats: (20 games in 22.7 MPG): 8.3 PPG – shooting splits 35.8/36.5/84.6
Even with those glaringly disappointing numbers after a career season in ’17-18, Ellington’s trade value is still very important to teams that are looking to fight their way through the playoffs and into the finals this season, with this year looking more wide open in the Eastern Conference in over a decade – even in the Western Conference, as its been a rollercoaster.
There are 5 trade destinations for Wayne Ellington in this column, and while all of them seem pretty linear for the time being, just getting an asset down the road like a draft pick is very underrated.
All trades have gone through the ESPN trade machines and are contractually legal.