The 21-21 Miami Heat are running out of patience with their inconsistent roster full of multi-million dollar role players, hoping to surpass basketball purgatory sometime soon. And while this semi-overpaid roster hasn’t disappointed in team chemistry, they may have a bigger cog in their machine with the boisterous Dion Waiters.
The Miami Heat are treading water as they try and stay afloat in the Eastern playoff push, as they are currently the 6th seed and are hoping to keep pushing forward down the second half of the regular season.
And while Miami’s early season injuries certainly don’t help them moving forward, they should have a deep enough team to get through the season even with their All-Star Goran Dragic being out for the next few weeks, as players like Dion Waiters and Wayne Ellington have been patiently waiting with their healthy bodies.
Head coach Erik Spoelstra seems to have forgone the idea of giving Ellington any more minutes, as he is pretty tied up with guards and wings in the rotations, with players like Derrick Jones Jr. surprising the staff with his upside.
However, with Dion Waiters not garnering much attention from the coaching staff on future minutes, you would have to assume that Waiters’ isn’t going to get a lot of playing time moving forward. And as you would expect, he hasn’t been exactly quiet about his feelings pertaining to his lack of minutes thus far.
Ira Winderman of the Sun Sentinel gave his thoughts on the situation earlier last week and quoted Waiters below after asking him if he thought he would play more:
"“Of course I envisioned that,’ he said. ‘You come back, you work your way slow and steadily. You keep increasing the minutes, at the end of the day. I don’t know what’s going on, so I can’t tell you.”"
Now here is where I, and probably Spo, disagree with Waiters’ sentiment on him “working his way slow and steadily.” From what I noticed during Waiters’ absence over the past year and a half, is that he played Fortnite while the Heat team played their games, instead of sitting on the bench or working out.
And while Waiters’ has also been very adamant that he doesn’t have to prove to anyone he has been working out, his overweight issues force me to believe the worst of him. The fact of the matter is this, when you pay a guard $12 million over the next few years, you expect that guard to at least try and get back from an injury.
Moreover, per Barry Jackson of the Miami Herald, we see a blatantly honest Waiters’ explain his disagreement with how his situation has been handled over the past few games:
"“[Expletive] patience!” he said. “I want to play. I’ve been patient long enough. What do I got to be patient for? Come on man. I’ve been patient. I think everybody knows that. It’s time. What are we waiting for? If I’m out there, play me.”"
The crazy ironic thing about this quote is this, Dion Waiters is anything but patient.
I am frankly tired of this player and believe he has become a poison on this team and franchise, this is quite possibly the worst re-signing of Pat Riley’s career and I think it’s time to move on from the 26-year-old guard who believes he is a superstar.
Here are 3 trades that can somehow help both parties.