Miami Heat: So, none of the Big 3 starting lineups were top 10 lineups?

The Miami Heat will forever be synonymous with the Big 3. When you start talking top starting lineups ever or relatively though, they better be in there.

The Miami Heat are a franchise that has come to be synonymous with greatness. In a relatively short-lived NBA existence, the Miami Heat have grown to become one of the more successful franchises in the league.

When thinking about the fact that they’ve only been around since 1988, their three NBA Championships are quite the accomplishment. While Pat Riley and Dwyane Wade themselves can take a ton of credit for all three, the second and the third title have a ton to do with the formation and inception of the Big 3 era.

One of the most formidable trios of all time, the Big 3 Miami Heat not only set the NBA world ablaze, but they took over the sports worlds, spawning the more frequent and open creation of superteams across all leagues. Not only were they three of the most talented players individually of their era, but together, they helped form one of the most talented starting lineups ever.

This is why this next factoid is so confounding to us. According to Bleacher Report and Andy Bailey of BR’s NBA wing, the Miami Heat don’t have a top 10 starting lineup in any year over the past 20. Well, first off if my math is correct,  the years of and between 2010-2014 were less than 10 full years ago, so that would be wrong. Second off, if you don’t believe this blasphemy from me, see for yourself.

What a take, right? Here are the meat and potatoes of it all.

When you have three of the most talented players of their era on the same team and in the same lineup, three in the top 15 to be exact, they immediately should jolt somewhere near the top if not the very top of the list. Some might point to the fact that there were quite a few different iterations of starting lineups for the Miami Heat during the Big 3 era and they may be right.

That doesn’t matter when it comes to this argument though and here’s why. When you put them alongside the greatest Miami Heat player ever and the number three shooting guard ever in NBA history in Dwyane Wade, a top 40-50 player ever in Chris Bosh, and arguably the greatest player to ever dribble a basketball in the NBA in LeBron James, that lineup is still one of the best ever assembled. This goes infinitely more when only considering over the last 20 years.

This is why I can’t consider this take to be a thorough or correct one, because it ignores the obvious and doesn’t account for the all-time greatness of the Big 3 themselves. This is also why I can’t take any all-time starting lineup rankings serious, in any time period or all time, that doesn’t include at least one Big 3 lineup. To be frank about it all though, to only include one season’s starting lineup of the Big 3 era would probably still be too few.