Miami Heat: How to adjust if Kelly Olynyk misses the start of the season

Miami Heat team president Pat Riley announced last week that Kelly Olynyk would miss the start of camp. How should they adjust if his injury extends into the season?

At Jimmy Butler‘s introductory press conference last week, Miami Heat team president Pat Riley announced that power forward Kelly Olynyk would not be ready to go for the start of training camp. Olynyk suffered a right knee bone bruise during training camp in mid-August for Team Canada in preparation for the FIBA World Cup.

A bone bruise can be a tricky thing to forecast. In the immediate aftermath of the injury, there was some unrealistic optimism that he might be back in time for the World Cup, although that was quickly struck down. It’s an injury that can take up to a couple months to heal, let alone to get into playing shape for NBA games.

Assuming a two-month recovery period, that would take us to right around the start of the regular season, completely missing both training camp and the preseason. And it’s safe to say Olynyk would not be in anything close to game shape by the time he gets back, which means the Miami Heat are going to have to start thinking of contingency plans in the likely case that he will not be able to play regular minutes at the start of the season.

The Heat do have a variety of players who could be considered capable to fill in for Olynyk at the four, at least in the short term and possibly long term. Among the options are James Johnson and Meyers Leonard, but almost surely the superior choice is Justise Winslow.

While he may find himself in competition for the starting point guard role as well, Winslow has the capacity to play any position from the one to the four. According to Basketball Reference, 34 percent of Winslow’s career minutes have been at the four (although take their categorization with a grain of salt considering they have him playing no minutes at point guard in his career), so he has no shortage of experience.

It’s also possible Winslow is just the better option at the four, period, even after Olynyk returns. If nothing else, the preseason and early days of the regular season could give head coach Erik Spoelstra the time and opportunity to try him out in the starting lineup alongside Bam Adebayo at center and Jimmy Butler at small forward.

This misfortune may end up being a positive for the Miami Heat if they do indeed find that Winslow fits better in the starting lineup than does Kelly Olynyk.