Has the Miami Heat front office aced the post-Jimmy Butler period? | Five on the Floor

Has the Miami Heat front office aced the post-Jimmy Butler period? | Five on the Floor

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[Applause] Welcome to Five on the Floor, a daily insider show on the Miami Heat and the NBA featuring Ethan Skolnick, Greg Sander, Alex Toledo, Brady Hawk, and others from the Five Reason Sports Network. Also, make sure to subscribe to Off the Floor for the most heat anywhere. Live on the floor. Here’s today’s floor plan. I’m Ethan Skol. You can follow me at Ethan Joliver in sports. I got Greg Savander. You can follow him at Greg Savand. The Miami Heater are 10 games into their season. They’ve played six of those games on the road. They’ve played seven or eight, I believe, against teams that made no seven against teams that made the playoffs last season. They haven’t had Tyler Hero for any of those 10 games. Bam Adabio has missed two games. He’s going to miss at least a third and probably a fourth and a fifth. Uh it’s going to be a little bit longer here. I know you had said that initially and I didn’t believe the dayto-day either. Uh and then uh Norm Powell, two games he’s missed. Eris Woler’s had to deal over the past couple games with what happened to him off the court uh with his house burning down as they flew back from Denver. Terry Rosier is taking up a roster spot, but isn’t allowed to play. The Heat came into the season without a roster spot, and again, they’re still six and four. Uh this was a stretch of the schedule that we said if they got out of it at like four and six, five on five and five, you’d be happy, especially after hero went down. Uh but they’re better than that. They’ve also developed a style that not only is working offensively, which is what everybody’s talking about, but the team is still top 10 in defensive rating. Uh it doesn’t look like that because they’re giving up like 120 points regularly, but it’s because of the pace that the players have bought into the pace. I asked both Spo and Norm Powell after the game after the win against Portland about sort of this empowerment. So, make sure you check that out. That’s all on the Twitter feed and we’ll do more about that in another episode. But I I want to focus on something bigger picture here, Greg. And we’re 10 games in the season. I’m not saying this team is going to get out of the playin necessarily. I’m not although the East, it doesn’t look like anybody is especially formidable. Detroit’s gotten off to a good start. Knicks have gotten off to a pretty good start, but Orlando has not looked like we thought. Uh they’re struggling with their new offense, actually. Atlanta is has without Trey Young for a month. Uh we’ve talked about the Milwaukee’s roster in general. I don’t think anybody believes in Chicago’s start. So if you if you look at all of that, you’re like, “Okay, they’re not badly positioned.” And they’re not badly positioned in part because we need to do this. And I’m sorry, I brought some water. Uhhuh. The uh You got some, too? Front office has had a pretty big cup. Really big cup. They’ve had a pretty damn good nine months. They’ve had a pretty damn good nine months. I mean, let’s let’s look at it here. And again, it has to sustain, but let’s go back to the position that they were in with Jimmy Butler, who did not want to be here anymore, who was creating major issues behind the scenes. I mean, the sigh of relief from everybody in that organization, which I talked about at the time, you feel it in that building. Okay, that locker room, the heaviness is gone. Like, everybody is themselves now. It’s just it’s different. Okay, Norm Powell, they are in love with him, this organization. And so, as you talked about, they’re going to extend him. It’s just a question of the price. Uh, but it’s it’s not just the on the court stuff. He’s just so low maintenance off the court also. And he’s bought into a leadership perspective. We kind of projected that. I said before the season, he would end up being the guy with BAM. Uh, he’s done that. That’s what I heard about him and all his other stops. And so, there again, the clouds have been lifted. It it feels healthy. And now let’s look back at everything they’ve done since they were backed into a corner with a Jimmy trade. They did not have a lot of options. And by the way, if Durant had gone to Golden State, which he didn’t want to do, they had no options, okay, at that point. And Jimmy would have been on the roster to the end of the season. But let’s look at it, Greg. Since that point, they acquired for Jimmy Butler, Andrew Wiggins. I’m going to give you some stats. Uh you tell me what you think of this, okay? Jimmy’s already complaining about defense and all the rest of this stuff in Golden State. 10 games this season for Andrew. 10 uh he’s uh nine for Jimmy. Jimmy’s averaging 18.7. Wiggins 17.3 rebounds 5.1 to 4.6 in favor of Jimmy. Assists, we know Wiggins is not a big passer. 4.3 to 2.3. Wiggins is out stealing him, out blocking him, shooting better from the field. 52% to 48%. They’re both at 40% from three. Jimmy’s at 40% from three. Look at that free throw percentage. Wiggins has struggled. Jimmy’s at 90%. But effective field goal percentage. Wiggins is at 59 and Jimmy’s at 52. Wiggins is making half the money. Greg, before we get to some of the others, and I talked to Wiggins last night, by the way, and there’s a big smile on his face for people who were concerned about that. And when I asked him about Tyler and all the and and what was going to happen when Tyler came back, he says, “I’m really looking forward to that.” So that’s another podcast, but he’s going to get more space. What do you make of just that topline? They could be paying Jimmy Butler $60 million right now. they could. And I I mean I think it’s okay to acknowledge that Jimmy Butler um this doesn’t discount what he did in Miami and how great he was. So like that’s where I want to start because I don’t want this to turn into that we’re saying, “Oh, look, they got a player better than Jimmy Butler.” Because what Jimmy was in Miami was truly unique. But you continued to talk about if you’re going to pay a guy, he has to be available and he has to continue to play at a certain level, right? And we’re seeing Jimmy has plateaued at a certain level. We know he can raise his game uh at moments for stretches. Uh, I guess, uh, conceptually for the Warriors, it’ll be in the playoffs when they need him to really, uh, step up when if Steph is, you know, out or in foul trouble or not shooting well, whatever the case is, right? But, so, I’m not saying Wiggins is necessarily the same impact player as Jimmy in in the biggest game, but dayto-day, Wiggins is providing statistically uh, a lot of what they were getting from Jimmy last year with so many less of the headaches. he’s bought in in a way where uh I think that they’re not rushing to trade him. They’re not like shopping him and stuff like that. Obviously, if a team offered a first round draft pick, you got to really evaluate that, right? But he has fit in in a way that last year I was reluctant to commit to him sticking around because I didn’t know that it just was a sometimes you just things don’t mesh and right that has completely reversed itself in terms of my what it my perception is is that the organization and the player in this sense are really um in a good place and you’re seeing it in the way that he plays. He’s not great every night, but you can kind of rely on what you get from him. And his temperament is a a a welcome thing for the locker room. They did they had a completely different vibe last year. And so, it’s all good things so far for him. And I don’t see them rushing to trade him as much as people want transactions. Well, it’s what I said about Powell. He’s low maintenance. Like they they don’t really have to worry about him. And I asked, you know, I said last night, I said, “This wasn’t your most efficient night. you still have take step up and take the shot. And he’s like, I like taking those shots in those situations because nobody cares about anything else if you make them. And that is the kind of attitude that that he has to have because they they’ve gone to him. It’s been swing swing and then it’s like he’s open and and if he’s going to be on the floor at the end, he’s like I wasn’t exactly sure this was going to close with him last night and I I say that last night as we’re recording this on Sunday. It wasn’t clear. He had he had Larson out there. He had uh Hawkins out there. He needed a big although he went with that thing with Wiggins at center for two possessions which was disastrous. Um but he he had DaVoni obviously had Norm. I think Wigs is going to close at the four uh most nights. I I just think that’s where we’re headed now. If Yoic does what he did last night. Uh my thing with Yoic though is that Spo’s got to let him play through the mistakes. He’s going to make a bunch of turnovers. He’s going to do some things. You’re like Nico, what are you doing? Okay. And you know that’s the that that that step back crossover whatever the heck Carden thing he was doing that Spo made fun of at the end. Um he’s going to do some of that but he’s got to play through those pockets. The thing with Nico I don’t know about is if you can trust him to be in there every night at the end of the game because they’re if he makes those kind of mistakes at the end of the game Spolster can’t leave him out there. So that’s kind of where it’s at. Like the six turnovers during the game not great. Okay. But but again you can recover from it. You can’t recover from a late turnover. That’s just like him not thinking. Uh and that’s there needs to be a little bit of development there beforehand with Wiggins suppose going to trust him at the end of the games to play. But let’s go beyond it. Okay. So, you got Wiggins. Well, you also then flipped uh with Toronto. Well, PJ Tucker you were never keeping. Okay. They were never keeping it. uh to get DaVon Mitchell, who has the best assist to turnover ratio that any Heat point guard has ever had to this stage of the season. He’s killing it in ISO situations, which I did not expect that. The three-point shooting is not where it was last season, but it’s leveled off about where we said it would be tolerable, which is around that 35% mark. He’s defending at a high level. He had was it him and Drew combined for nine steals last night. That’s part of the Jimmy trade. Okay. Mhm. And we said at the time again, this guy is a perfect Heat fit. They’ve been scouting him for a couple years. He’s found a true home in his third stop. But then go beyond DaVon. We haven’t even seen Casperis yet. And to me, the final form of this offense, which is this read and react thing, I know Cass likes pick and rolls, which is going to be interesting to see how they reinccorporate that. But once he’s ready to get there, there’s going to be pockets of the game for him. I think it may not come this season. It may not come until the second half of the season where he’s running that and by the way he’s the guy who can unlock wear ultimately offensively because of his ability to we’ve seen that already. Okay, with the lock it may help Bam too. It should help Bam when Bam comes back. And so they added him a high-end prospect in a draft that’s proving to be a great draft so far. Okay, there like six candidates. Caniple looks great. Uh Cedric Coward looks great. Okay, and people were down on the draft. Remember how they said like the the first round picks were no different than the late second round picks, right? No, but it’s been really good. It’s been Flag who struggled, but that’s cuz they’ve got him in the wrong spot. But Cass was part of that group. Like, he’s going to get there, okay, at some point. It may not be right away. So, you added all that and then remember they also got Kyle Anderson who they weren’t going to keep this year but they were able to use Kyle Anderson’s contract to complete the Norm Powell trade which is the other which is honestly there’s no comparison now. It is the best move that any team made this entire offseason. I I’ve looked at all of them in terms of what you gave up and what you brought back. You gave up two players who were not going to be on your rotation. One was basically there for vibes. Okay. the other. Kyle Anderson was a player you didn’t want to consistently play because he does some good things but he was holding back others. You give up these two guys and they were Kyle Anderson, you know, so they they it it wasn’t a situation where they got him and they were they were excited when they had him. But had they had the opportunity to send him elsewhere, Ethan, and get completely under the tax, they probably would have. And it’s but I I say that because it’s also interesting and um and and it reminds us that things happen for a reason, I guess, right? Because that deal was the exact number they needed when they put it together with other contracts to get to Norman Sal, you know, Powell’s salary, right? And let’s look at the other part of the Powell thing. The Clippers called the heat on Powell because they wanted John Collins, but they also knew they were probably going to get Bradley Beal. There were Heat fans who wanted the Heat and this Bradley Beal thing that never died. Bradley Beiel is one of the worst regulars in the NBA right now. It’s not just a contract thing. He’s been awful. I mean, go check out what Clipper fans are saying. They are like besides themselves that Norm is not there anymore. Okay? Like just look at some of the the if you look at the the people that I follow on he on Clippers Twitter, okay? The people who are prominent out there, they’re miserable that Norm was downgraded to Bradley Beal. Now, they got the Clippers got Bradley Beal at half the number that that the Heat got or less than half the number that the Heat are have Powell and they didn’t want to extend Powell, but I think Clipper fans right now would have been okay with them extending Powell. So, you end up getting you’ve got you’ve gotten again, you didn’t get Powell for Jimmy, okay, but you needed a piece to complete the Powell trade. They tried to trade Heismith in that deal, but the Clippers didn’t want Heismith. And then I know he fans were upset about packaging and and there’s two more deals to talk about, so I’ll get to you. I’ll let you wrap on all this. So then you trade Highmith and I know people were upset about them dealing Highmith and not getting a pick for him earlier and having to include a pick. Hayward hasn’t played yet. Okay. All right. Like and I’m not saying let’s see if Brooklyn gets something for him. Everybody assumes that that’s possible and maybe but the the way that Shane Badier said he was no use on bad teams. Heywood Highmith is the same. He’s not as good as Shane Badier, but he’s very similar in that he’s only useful on a team. Yeah, he has to be on one of like 10 to 12 teams in the league that you could plug him in. Again, his defense slipped. And we like Haywood. That’s not it. But also trading Haywood cleared the path for Haimey. Yep. If and Larson and Larson because you were not going to play all three of them. We know Spo was down on on Haywood, but he did go to him at certain times and him not being in the equation has freed them up to play the young guys. We didn’t Now you’ll say, “Well, of course you’re going to play Hawkeyes.” We were not saying, “Of course you’re going to play Hawkeyes before the season.” Okay, nobody saw this coming. Nobody saw this coming. Okay, now he’s a sixman of the year and most improved player candidate through 10 games. And then there’s the other trade where they traded Duncan who, God bless his heart, did plenty of stuff for Miami. He’s starting to play pretty well in Detroit, but again, he’s on the other side of 30. You were going to be committing money to him. Okay. You pick up Fonteo, who’s a different kind of shooter, but has given you production at a cheaper cost slightly without the long-term commitment. So, Greg, Greg, Greg, I’ll let you wrap on this and we’ll talk about the other side of this. So, since the Jimmy trade, okay, since you backed in a quarter with Jimmy, you got Wiggins who’s hit big shots for you and has production that’s close to Jimmy so far. You got DaVon Mitchell now. He ressigned to a two-year contract on $12 million per year. And he has been elite elite as as a in isolation and an assist to turnover turnover ratio. Like he’s playing at a better level than he did last year in my view. Okay. Sure. Three-point shooting is not quite what it was, but everything else is better. Okay. Offensively. Okay. You got you got uh Casper, who we haven’t even seen yet. All right. And I I expect good things from him down the road. Let’s just trust Adam Simon on this. All right. So, you got Casperis on that. You got a piece that you were able to finalize the deal for Powell with the with the contract and Kyle Anderson. You got Fonte and you got uh and again, you had to give up a second round pick with Haywood. Okay. But you cleared a path for these other guys and you don’t have Duncan’s money sitting on your books for the next few years. I mean, I don’t know if you don’t call that like an A+ considering the circum and I was not calling it an A+ at the time. I said it was a B. But looking at it now, if you don’t call that an A+, I don’t know what they have to do. Okay. Other than get Jokic to demand a trade to Miami. Like I to me, that’s a pretty damn good nine months. Yeah. And there were fans that actually were giving them far worse grades. And they were um you know, talked about as uh a team that you didn’t just no one knew what this group was going to be. And it’s because the the secret element of this that we couldn’t predict. We weren’t talking about it. Uh Zack Low alluded to it in the off season because um I have a hunch that maybe him and Spo every once in a blue moon and he said look for their offense to look differently. And it was very quick comment and then he moved on with his show. Right. And what we just couldn’t quantify, estimate, or you can’t, you know, have the foresight to say that it was going to happen is the entire shift in the way that they play and the way that the roster complements that. Now, these guys are hitting shots. It’s only 10 games in, but the 20 game mark, Ethan, is when usually this organization has always said that’s when we’re going to make our first uh like let’s just call it like a quarterly review where they’re like checking up on the roster and seeing where they feel they are, where they could get to uh all that kind of stuff. So, they’re halfway there and they’re six and four. Uh one of the best offenses in the league, the pace, assists are way up. It’s just a completely different brand of basketball. And that’s when as they were accumulating different pieces and um pulling the roster together, you know, we on our preview show where I did say I thought Hakez was going to have a bounceback year. I just want to document that and I’ll go grab that clip. But we also said, does this team have enough size? Still question mark. And do they have enough shooting? And look at what we’ve watched. And they they had a lot more than I think we expected them to have, but the system is a big credit to all this. And it and it reinforces that the most valuable asset of all of them, including all the first round draft picks, is still Eric Spolstra. Well, and that’s the way they view it. If you the way to the way to circumvent, so to speak, to use a a dirty word, uh the salary cap and the luxury tax is to pay the the other people uh a good amount of money and make them comfortable and and have them bring out the best in your talent. Now, do they need a top-end guy to win a championship? Yes. We’re not going to argue otherwise, but they’ve gotten some guys to pop that they could be pieces to get that guy now. And that is one of the better developments of the first 10 games. All right, we’ll close this thing up on the other side. And again, still doing this. I’m I’m not saying this team’s going to win 55 games. I just it’s but I I think from a backed into a corner position, what we were looking at where Jimmy didn’t want to really play anymore for them and what they’ve come out of it with uh is is pretty pretty damn good. And and I there were a couple chuckles last night from people I spoke to at the arena about Jimmy already complaining about things in Golden State. So, it’s it’s it’s going to continue. All right. Uh, here’s what you should never complain about. Where did my money go, right? You don’t want that. I mean, yeah. I mean, when Greg when I lend Greg money, he doesn’t pay me back. But, I mean, that’s not because of the app. It’s Cash App. Check it out. We’re going to tell you how to sign up uh for it and again get and some additional cash, but we’re going to tell you about the card also. 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Cash App is a financial services platform, not a bank. Banking services provided by Cash App’s bank partners. Prepaid debit cards issued by Sutton Bank member FDIC. Discounts provided by Cash App at Blocking Brand. Visit cash.app/legal/mpodcast back/legal back/mpodcast for full disclosures. All right. When we do this, we have to acknowledge that a lot of the reason they were stuck in the position that they were in last February was because of decisions that didn’t go as well, right, as some of these had, including the Terry Rosier thing, which is the cloud that, you know, it’s that cloud’s never going away. All right. Like in far as you know, you’re regretting that first round pick. And of course, the league’s not going to give them any relief at this point and all the rest. You hope maybe they will, but I’m not expecting it. Um I don’t think they’re expecting it anytime soon. And Barry’s well documented like the seven different things that the Heat have been screwed on with that. And we probably should do an episode on that as well. Barry, you’re invited. Uh you tell I worked for all your bosses. Okay. It’s just the damn podcast. Okay. You can come on. You can speak to us. Uh you’re not going to Well, just review his writing. It’s all in. That’s it. That’s it. Well, this is why newspapers are dying because they don’t want to promote their own people. There’s a lot of reasons, but that’s one of them. So, anyway, we’ll just I’ll Bye, Harold. As as small as we may be, right? That’s what they said about me five years ago. Anyway, sorry, got off the subject. Uh Terry Rosir, um not a great transaction. What do you think? Do you think the organization learned anything since then that led to these moves or is this just chance that a lot of this stuff has worked out? Um, it’s partly chance. I think the Norman Pal trade like that kind getting that kind of value uh for you for basically nothing like they gave up nothing. uh that is you just don’t expect for those opportunities to show themselves. So you do you do have to acknowledge that that is an outlier in terms of trades. Usually you have to give up something to get a player as good as Norm. Uh the Clippers are doing weird stuff. They wanted the oldest roster on planet Earth and they got it. And it for me it’s um I lost my train of thought. No, I Well, I know what you’re saying. Is that the norm thing that you can’t expect that that’s going to happen again, right? Like they literally got a phone call from a team that was wanted to Sorry. Now I’ll pick back up. Sorry. Thank you for for connecting the dots for me. you don’t know how a roster is going to respond to a new system. And so that was the big element that also when we look back on things I think we need to acknowledge that we just didn’t know how they would respond and it’s only been 10 games but even if the wins and losses don’t stay great um like they may you know hover around 500 for periods of time remember we’re doing this review Ethan and and it’s without Bam in the last few games and no Tyler at all so they’ve still got the upside of that coming uh down the road. So, uh it it’s an interesting thing where I don’t know that it was so much strategic as they got, but you got to get kind of lucky to bounce back from these things. But the the one thing that they did do is they appear to have pulled together pieces that complement each other enough to where this system is being executed and flourishing. And so you have to definitely acknowledge that pieces and personalities. I I think it’s both actually. I I this is a group that they they they fit. It’s just very loose in there. And I we always talk about his winning lead to chemistry, his chemistry lead to winning. Uh I do think we’ve seen Bam take more of a leadership role this year even than last year. You saw him pulling where aside and I I I thought Norm would help with that and he has. Uh they they click. Jimmy and Bam did not click by the end. We talked about it a lot. Okay. They really didn’t. They had two completely different personalities. All right. I mean, it’s and then resentment about an extension. Resentment about an extension. And then I I do think fair resentment the other direction. B. Uh we talked about this too. Every community event had to be BAM. Every every appearance with the media after a bad game had to be BAM, right? Like at a certain point, like I don’t care if you’re the nicest dude on earth, and he is. Okay. You don’t want that Like I mean, seriously, like why don’t that guy do it? Like I’m not saying I’m not I’m not speaking for him. I’m just saying as you watched the two of them, it never felt comfortable. It never felt close. Not like it did at first. It did for the first year and and he would and Jimmy would praise him and all the rest of that, but like towards the end like no, it’s just and and you know that’s why again the cloud needed to be cleared. It’s not that Jimmy didn’t do incredible things. Look, Shaq did incredible things, okay, for here for you know, well, more so the first year than the second year, but they won the championship the second year. Check out our 2006 series. By the way, we’re going to be airing more of those episodes coming up with Matteo. Uh cuz then the heater start to honor it as well. But I it just like I think Bam needed a low-key personality with him, but somebody who is going to also inspire him to speak up. And I I it just looks like they have a very natural calm kind of chemistry there. But Norm is very driven. He just doesn’t need to tell you about it. And I I just I feel like this is this is where they need to be. They need more talent. No question. Some of this talent emerging helps them with that. But the one thing I I and I don’t want to devote we we’re almost out of time here. I don’t not I want to devote a full episode to this. I wonder and put this in your pocket and write it down because I I want I think this is important to be talking about. If you’re a player around the NBA right now and you’re watching the Heat play, you’re watching the empowerment and the freedom that a a a worldclass coach is giving them. Don’t you want to play in that? Do you want to play in a system like say the Grizzlies are playing in right now where this this is a European coach? Okay. Spolster is an American coach employing eur some European style you’re talking about. But a European coach where they don’t plate the super the stars or the players or anything like that. that they have a different culture about the way they go about that stuff. We saw with David Blat when he came to Okay, like do you want to I’m not saying TP is going to go to want to go to Memphis, but you’re going to want to go to an organization to play for a coach who’s very like this or a coach who basically said, “Look, I know I’m good at what I do, but I’m going to give you guys I’m all I’m doing is I’m going to take care of the spacing for you. That’s it. Okay, we’re I’m going to create spacing for you. I’m going to hammer that down. When the ball’s in your hands, though, go.” Okay? Like if I’m a star player who is not heavily relying on pick and rolls like say a jaw, okay, but just somebody who just wants to play. Do you know how good Kevin Durant would have been in this damn system? I know. And that’s right. I I think like as we close here, we have to acknowledge that um when the dust settled on the Jimmy Butler situation, everyone was going to ask what would be left. And it appears as if there’s a really good mix of some um you know, we’ll call them all stars because Bam’s been won three times, Tyler’s been one once. Uh Norm isn’t quite in that group, but really good vet. They’ve got some good young players and they have a lot of there’s no dead weight necessarily on the roster other than the Roier situation being unresolved, but they have pieces and they have options. And I think that that is something that uh we we wondered what it was going to all look like after the Jimmy Butler era was over. It’s not easy when a strong personality who took you as far as Jimmy did exits. Like organizations usually have to like take a couple years to figure out where the hell they’re going to turn it. And it seems like the Heat have kind of built the plane as they were taking off and here we are. Yeah, it’s it’s been impressive so far. We’ll see if it sustains. No BAM coming up in the first game against Cleveland. This is the team that destroyed this team by 92 points in the last two games. Cleveland is not whole right now. Um they’re missing some players also. Well, they have gotten a couple back. Brusa is still out. Uh it’ll be interesting to see if the Heat match up. I’ll tell you if the Heat had a split and they’re seven and five coming out of this first 12 and then you’re starting we’re starting to count down the days till Bam and Tyler coming back playing this stuff. I’ll say this, Greg, being in the arena last night that place is lit up again. They that is they’re not expecting the team to crash anymore like they were last year. Okay, that was post Jimmy, too. They’re not expecting the team to fall apart. It’s like you don’t really want to leave cuz it’s it’s fun. Like, yeah, they’re going to give up some points, but they’re going to get some back. And it’s just so much more fun watching that than watching them try to grind to a 100. Like, I it’s this is it’s been an enjoyable 10 games so far. And there was somebody who talked to me from inside who said, “You’re too down on this team.” They said that before the season. They said, “We like what we have. Norm’s going to be an all-star. You’re going to see.” Okay. I’m I’m I’m I’m my ears are open. I I’ve and my eyes have been Okay. It’s it’s it’s been an interesting mix. It’s been fun. Uh we’ll see if it continues. All right. Appreciate it, Greg. Uh, check out our sponsors, Cash App. Use the code secure 10. Prize picks. Use the code F I V. Thank you for listening to the five on the floor on the Fiver Sports Network. After all, someone needs to listen to my dad.

Things were looking bleak in the middle of last season for the Miami Heat. Jimmy Butler was pouting, pushing the team into a corner. But it seems like they’ve come out of it OK. Ethan Skolnick and Greg Sylvander look at all the moves since last February, and how they’re playing into the current success.

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