The Miami Heat are a good team in the NBA, but are they NBA Title contention worthy? AUCH Site Experts Kenneth Wilson and Duncan Smith take on it here.
The Miami Heat have been one of the absolute best teams in the NBA this season. They sport the NBA’s best home record currently. They have also taken down their fair share of the NBA’s Goliaths.
Although early on in the season, they were able to pick off James Harden, Russell Westbrook, and their Houston Rockets, holding Westbrook to one of his worst games of the season along the way. They were also able to walk into Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee, Wisconsin and knock of Giannis Antetokounmpo and his Bucks, in their home arena as we mentioned and so you don’t miss it.
Looking deeper at their in-conference wins, they have knocked off the Brooklyn Nets, the Indiana Pacers, the Toronto Raptors, and the Philadelphia 76ers on two occasions. They’ve beaten the 76ers in Philadelphia and in Miami, while they were the first team to pluck the Raptors on their home floor this season.
The prior facts beg of a question though, are the Heat serious title contenders heading into the New Year? AUCH Site Experts Kenneth Wilson and Duncan Smith will give their quick takes below. Here goes nothing!
Kenneth Wilson (@ksaidwhat)
The Miami Heat are definitely title contenders. In the NBA, anything can happen in a seven-game series between two teams that are at least somewhat even. There is no team that is just that much better than the Miami Heat in the league, so they should be close enough to any team to have a chance to win any given series that they may find themselves in.
They are probably the best team in the East if you ask me, which in itself gives credence to the fact that they are title contenders. With a great shot to win the Eastern Conference, that only leaves the question of competing against a Western Conference team for the whole shebang. With a title on the line and with the stuff that all Miami Heat teams are made of, we call it Heat Culture, that shouldn’t be a problem.
The Miami Heat will want to continue to polish up their defense, rebounding, and rotations to get more depth deployed, but they are all fixable issues. After cleaning these things up and for all the prior reasons before that part, that is why I definitely believe the Miami Heat are title contenders as we get ready to flip the calendar to 2020 and the last two-thirds of the NBA season.
Duncan Smith (@DuncanSmithNBA)
The Miami Heat have been full of surprises, largely thanks to the stunning development of Kendrick Nunn and Duncan Robinson. Entering the season, if you’d know that Jimmy Butler would struggle from the floor, Justise Winslow and Goran Dragic would both miss much of the season, and they would get less than nothing from both James Johnson and Dion Waiters, you would expect a record much worse than their 24-9 after 33 games.
Nunn and Robinson have been that elevating difference. They’ve been great, but as they face more elite competition as the season goes on, they have virtually no margin for error and this duo might not raise your ceiling much against the best of the best in the NBA.
They will either need to make a trade of some sort to improve their depth or top-end talent (both of which are difficult given the roster and cap situation the Miami Heat find themselves in), or get Winslow back and hope he has the season of his life.
This team has been outstanding in a lot of ways, but to have a title shot they need at least one more major piece. Whether that piece is Justise Winslow or another remains to be seen.