All's Not Well In Miami

http://bostonherald.com/sports/celtics_nba/nba_coverage/2014/07/all_s_not_well_in_miami



All’s not well in Miami
Pat Riley, Miami Heat must get creative to compete



Miami Heat President Pat Riley


Sunday, July 13, 2014
By:  Steve Bulpett



Remember all those season-ticket sales people the Heat fired after they signed LeBron James four years ago? Well, let’s just say the unemployment rate in Miami may be shrinking just a bit in the coming days and weeks.

When the best player in the NBA showed up, tickets sold themselves, and there were more of them. The upper reaches of American Airlines Arena, theretofore curtained off so as to hide their unoccupiedness, were suddenly saleable items.

If James was in the building, people wanted to keep him company. It mattered not that he was several floors down and behind a velvet rope, you could tell people that you and LeBron were in the same club last night.

But now there is not the same simple order-taking in the Heat offices. The (sales) pitch counts will rise significantly.

The marketing department that could make any idea work by slapping LeBron’s picture on it will now have to get creative in the search for a slogan. Some of those being considered:

“Plenty of good seats available.”

“What time can you make it?”

“We’re still playing even though he’s not here.”

A number of NBA types were shocked and stunned when Chris Bosh blew off a seemingly wonderful chance to compete for an NBA title with his home state Rockets to re-enlist with Riley’s Raiders. (Guess the whole “I’m coming home” thing was just a brief fad.)

And the word is that Dwyane Wade, after opting out of nearly $42 million, will re-sign with Miami, despite interest from other clubs. He is not worth that kind of money now, and if he signs for less, hey, look at all the money he’ll save in not having to hire a mover.

As they presently stand, the Heat are basically lukewarm at best. It is hard to see what they can possibly do to get anywhere near a fifth straight appearance in The Finals.

However, the offseason night is still young.

Pat Riley can talk a seagull off a french fry, and Andy Elisburg is one of the best front office minds who doesn’t get mentioned for other jobs. But looking out on this summer Sunday morning, it’s hard to see how this works out.

Bosh is 30 years old and is much more a complementary player than go-to guy. Wade is 32 and requires serious playing time management to hope his knees can make it through a postseason. Both will make major money. To seriously contend for a championship, the Heat need to find a player better than Bosh and Wade who may have to be willing to take less than those mates.

In a strictly meteorological sense, it’s a given that most people, leaving home to run with the NBA circus anyway, would rather spend their winter in Miami rather than Minneapolis or Boston. The grass is always greener in those places where it still grows in January.

But, if they’re worth pursuing in the first place, players will also choose to be somewhere they can win. Now Miami has some convincing to do.

It’ll be interesting to see how Riley plays this. Will he go again with the same “I got this covered” confidence that lit his postseason press conference?

“How can we keep the guys together?” he said then. “We’re prepared. We’ve got the main thing all written up. Whatever it takes to keep them together, we’re ready for. Let’s stay here and try to keep this thing going. I don’t think we need to recruit Dwyane, LeBron and Chris again.”

Then there was this gem: “I think everybody needs to get a grip. This stuff is hard. You have to stay together and find the guts. You don’t find the first door and run out of it.”

It was priceless stuff from a man who’d taken the Knicks to The Finals and later resigned by fax. A man who built the 2012 and ’13 champions by getting LeBron James to run out of a door in Cleveland.

It’s never wise to doubt Pat Riley’s ability to write a new script, but right now he’s looking a little like Kevin Bacon at the end of “Animal House,” standing on the sidewalk shouting, “Remain calm. All is well.”

That may be so in Miami eventually, but it ain’t the case right now.




bob
MY NOTE:  "Pat Riley can talk a seagull off a french fry".  I'm stealing it.



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