Russell doesn’t rank in the top hundred. Although the season has been short thus far and yes, while he’s on a poor team, Russell doesn’t even crack the top 400. Russell ranks in at 410 as of Wednesday evening.
While he may be an offensive machine, his defense won’t get it done in South Beach. While there are other nuances to his game that we could talk about as well, his lack of want to on that end of the floor at times won’t is a problem.
Lastly, there’s the money. Russell is currently signed to a four-year deal, averaging $29,331,375 per year, that pays him $27.2 million this year, $28.6 the next, $30 million in the third, before closing the deal by paying him $31.3 in the fourth and final year. That is a lot of money on the books to be paying a guy like Russell if you ask here, especially when you consider Butler’s contract and the production the Heat are getting out of some of their more efficiently acquired talent.
While Russell could go on to do amazingly great things, the opportunity to find out shouldn’t come in Miami. He costs too much, could disrupt too much, and simply doesn’t fit the bill of the culture. Hard but it’s fair, sad but it’s so, but that’s just the way things are.