Miami Heat: Duncan Robinson Was A Top Defender In Bucks Series

While a first-round exit in the 2021 NBA Playoffs wasn’t the most pleasing, the Miami Heat were severed by a relentless and dominating Milwaukee Bucks franchise. However, in the entire four games of disposition, confusion, and doubt, a bright spot for the Miami Heat in this series was none other than the improved defense from one of the league’s premier marksmen, Duncan Robinson.

While there were several Heat players who just couldn’t get it going, offensively, through the entire series, Robinson wasn’t an exception. After scoring 24 points in Game 1, with all seven of his 13 field-goal attempts from beyond the arc, the Bucks limited Robinson to just 17 points on just 3-16 in the final three games.

This display has drawn similarities to last year’s Semi-Finals, where the Bucks keyed-in on the Miami Heat sharpshooter. There wasn’t a tremendous difference in the shot attempts this time around either.

After totaling 37 field-goal attempts in last year’s six-game Semi-Finals against the Bucks, Robinson had just 29 in this year’s series. Although it’s been documented and proven that Duncan has made adjustments in many areas of his game or though it wasn’t enough to change the fate against this team, they are still worth a mention.

For Duncan, you like his upgraded abilities to make timely cuts to the hoop, seeing the floor, and most importantly, a vast uptick in his defense — for what’s been the largest negative connotation early in his career. And while it isn’t a huge sample size with Milwaukee’s three-game onslaught, there were some incredible moments where the 27-year old forward took on the Bucks’ top stars.

The Miami Heat needed more, but Duncan Robinson showed a ton in this latest series.

In this series, Robinson held all of his Milwaukee matchups to just 19-42 shooting from the field. Most notably, he kept Bucks standout guard, Jrue Holiday, to just 1-for-8 while being defended in 3:14 minutes of the series.

Even further, Duncan finished with a 116 Defensive Rating in the first-round, ranked third-best for the Heat, and even tied All-Star teammate, Jimmy Butler. Of course, there shouldn’t be scenarios where Duncan should be confused for Jimmy on the defensive end but for the Heat to have a poor series of not being able to stop anyone, this one should be considered fair-game.

He’s defended just as well as a player who’s been a four-time mention of an NBA All Defensive Team. Though the exercise is still more relative than absolute.

Specifically and in the last two years, teams have recognized Robinson as the Heat’s biggest defensively liability and have rightfully exploited ways to attack him. However, an undervalued testimony of Duncan’s improvement has been his awareness.

Throughout the 2021 season and further into the postseason, he’s shown enhanced awareness, knowledge of the rotation, good switching, and more simply, the ability get a hand in the face of shooters. Albeit, there were plenty of sequences in this series where Duncan gave minimal space for matchups that still managed to hit shots over him.

The Miami Heat saw great improvement from Duncan Robinson this season on defense, though more is needed.

As a defender, it’s all you can really do, as sometimes great defense just isn’t enough on better offense. While this final possession for the Bucks resulted in a Khris Middleton go-ahead basket to seal Game 1, you couldn’t have asked Duncan to defend this any better.

With an initial clear-out, Middleton calls for a high-screen from Brook Lopez. In an effort to get to one of his favorite mid-range spots, an area where much of Middleton’s game has been patented throughout his career, he does so to convert a huge game-winning shot.

As Middleton gets the switch on Trevor Ariza, Robinson collapses and denies any sort of available entry pass to the much-taller Brook Lopez. Duncan, however, realizes that Bam Adebayo is in position to recover on Lopez and still gets out for an excellent shot-contest on Middleton.

While the Heat defense was just as helpless at it had ever been, to see Robinson make strides in this series puts him closer to becoming a plus defender moving forward. The effort was there.

Needless to say, the occasional lapses and silly fouls remain an issue (led Miami with 13 fouls for the series, including five in Game 4) for Duncan, but there should be hope that he remains with the organization which has helped him make those leaps and bounds. That stands for both ends of the floor.

This upcoming summer, Robinson enters as an Restricted Free Agent, where he could command as much as $20-25 million a year and it’ll be the Heat’s choice to match any offer for him. There is a scenario where Robinson could receive a deal similar to Brooklyn Nets forward Joe Harris, who signed a four-year and $75 million contract with an annual salary just under $19 million back in November of last year.

Regardless, teams should definitely look into the strides Duncan has made defensively. As great of a specialist for which he already is, there’s much of the game that he still needs — and will continue to learn at a strong progression.