With 14 players currently under guaranteed contract for the 2025-26 season, the Miami Heat have one more roster spot to fill. If the latest rumors are true, they may not sign a 15th player anytime soon.
While reuniting with Precious Achiuwa is up for consideration, the Heat have so far shown an unwillingness to begin the year inside the luxury tax. According to the Miami Herald’s Barry Jackosn, this could prompt them to hold off on adding a 15th player until December, when a pro-rated minimum deal would keep them outside the tax.
This logic is all sorts of flawed. The Heat need another big man. Nikola Jovic and Kel’el Ware aren’t enough to ensure the team doesn’t overtax Bam Adebayo. And while the Heat’s aversion to the tax is neither revelatory nor indefensible, their insistence on staying out of it now remains all sorts of bizarre.
The Heat don’t have to wait until December…
Teams have until the end of the league’s 2025-26 calendar to exit the luxury tax. That gives the Heat plenty of time to add a 15th player, and cut costs later.
Walking this path is admittedly prohibitive when you need to save a bunch of money. Cost-cutting deals are tougher to strike in the middle of the season, when fewer teams have flexibility. But Miami has nothing to worry about here.
Let’s use Achiuwa as an example—even though, if we’re being honest, his fit isn’t the cleanest. A minimum salary for a player with his experience (five years) runs a little over $2.3 million. Signing him would leave the Heat about $4.2 million into the tax.
That’s…nothing. Miami could almost certainly shed that money before the February 5 trade deadline, or ahead of the 2026 NBA draft—without including a sweetener.
Heat fans might be better off rooting for the December plan anyway
With all of this said, the Heat do not seem particularly keen on beginning the season inside the tax, only to duck it later. Jackson says they are more likely to waive Terry Rozier, save $1.7 million, and then sign another player.
Although this scenario won’t do anything to compromise Miami’s cap-space plans, it severely limits what the team can accomplish on the midseason trade market. Rozier has little to no on-court value at his current price point, but his expiring contract can serve as a salary anchor in deals with teams looking to lop off long-term money.
Waiving him now removes those opportunities from the table. It also increases the chances that the Heat would have to include one or both of Norman Powell and Andrew Wiggins in any win-now trade.
Forced to choose between paying Rozier to leave and waiting until December to add another free agent, there’s really no choice at all. Fans should root for the latter. It isn’t ideal, but it beats needlessly restricting Miami’s trade options.