Goran Dragic Should Stop Trying To Fit In To The Heat Offense

Even though we are only 7 games into the NBA season, it is becoming increasingly clear that the biggest obstacle the Miami Heat have to overcome (besides health) for the rest of this season is reminding Goran Dragic to play his style of basketball instead of try to adjust to how his teammates play. Thru the first 7 games, Dragic is most of the time bring the ball up to the three-point line and passing the ball to Dwyane Wade or Chris Bosh so they can create their own shot as well as facilitate for the rest of the team while Dragic stands in a spot behind three-point line waiting for an opportunity to shoot. As a result of this, the Heat starting lineup besides Hassan Whiteside is taking most of their field goals attempts from 16 feet to the three-point line. A perfect example of this is Loul Deng, according to basketball reference Deng so far this season is taking 34.9 percent of his field goals attempts from behind three-point line meanwhile he only takes 30.2 percent of his field goals attempts from 0-3 feet. This is because they don’t have the speed to constantly get by their defender and when they decide to attack the basket they either take a contested shot or pass it back out.

If the Miami Heat want to reach the eastern conference finals they need to run  a similar offense like they ran when LeBron James was on the team. Most of the time have Goran Dragic be the primary ball handler who is attacking the basket and have Wade slashing towards the basket just in case the defense collapses on Dragic then Dragic passes the Wade underneath the basket and Bosh standing at the free throw waiting for an opportunity to shoot. This will spread the floor and create more open looks for the rest of the team. The only concern is that this concept / idea is going to take many months to come to fruition because Dragic wants to be a good teammate and not step on anybody’s toes