Heat in 5: Duncan Robinson, the driver, Jimmy's back, and much more
In the second installment of Heat in 5, a weekly space where I go over the things I liked and didn't like from the Heat in recent times, I chose to be a full on optimist and go with only positives from this past week. We have Duncan Robinson, Jaime Jaquez Jr., we stay with Highsmith and welcome playoff Jimmy back, in November.
By António Dias
1️⃣ Duncan driving the Heat
With Tyler Herro out, Duncan Robinson was the man chosen to replace him. And it has paid dividends. Duncan is scoring 20.3 points per game since Herro went down, shooting 40.5% from three on more than nine attempts per game. But that's not the most impressive part of Robinson's game. The Heat sharpshooter has been driving to the rim. A lot. With 6.3 drives a game in the last four appearances, he's second on the team - behind Jimmy Butler, who's second in the NBA in that time span - converting 46.2% of his drives for third place on the Heat in points off drives.
Notice the patience in Robinson's drive in the first two clips. First, he gets a lot of space from the Bam screen and is matched up with Okongwu. He surveys the situation and when he notices the defense collapsing on Bam, decides to go by himslef, before the shot blocker can get there.
In the second clip, he does just a fantastic job of faking Wembanyama, who's expecting him to retreat, but Duncan stays with the play and lives the rookie behind for an easy finishih. The third clip is just a demonstration of how his shooting gravity, especially in the Nets game, allows him to better attack the rim, since Dinwiddie is not at all worried about that and just wants to take away the three. Then, at the basket, that's just an insane finish.