In terms of offense, Waiters is a throw back in many ways. He is an isolation heavy two guard that likes to take a lot of shots in the mid range. It is no coincidence that he had his best season and averaged career lows in number of shots between three feet and the three point line. Waiters took almost 67% of his shots at the rim and from the three point line. He shot decently at the rim, but he shoot a career best from three, with almost 40%. It will be interesting to see if Waiters can replicate that success from three this year. Without the three point shot falling, Waiters may not be a great player to have on the floor. He re-signed with Miami this summer and Waiters and the Heat have a great deal of confidence that he can help them get back to the playoffs and be a tough out for one of the top four East teams. The Heat do not really have any players as dynamic as Waiters. As much as I do dislike his game sometimes, Waiters has a knack of getting to the rim and he can make difficult shots. The Heat have had success with Waiters because they have helped him realize that he needs to shoot more threes and not take too many shots away from the rim. Although not a great defender in Cleveland, Waiters is playing hard and defending for Miami. Waiters has a chance to be very good for the Heat. If he has a great season, I could see the Heat as the five or six seed in the East with a legitimate chance to upset someone in the playoffs. If he struggles, the Heat might have trouble getting into the playoffs. To have your franchise's fate rest with Dion Waiters aka Google Me aka Headache aka Downhill Dion aka Kobe Wade is a scary thought, but Miami is a strange place.
A great thing about Basketball Reference is that under the names of players you can see their various nicknames. For some, it's ones that you know like Lebron James' page has King as one of his nicknames. If you find yourself staring at Dion Waiters' page you will see four nicknames. They are Downhill Dion, Google Me, Headache, and Kobe Wade. I am not sure what to say after that, but Kobe Wade was apparently what he told his college teammates to call him. Downhill Dion is solid, Google Me is fantastic, and Headache seems to fit more than the others. Dion Waiters was the fourth pick in the 2012 NBA Draft out of Syracuse University. At the time, many questioned the selection by the Cavaliers because Waiters had not started for his college team and seemed to be a player that would not fit with Kyrie Irving, whom they had drafted the year before. There are no take backs on draft night and Dion Waiters joined the Cavs and Irving. He played two and a half seasons with the Cavs and took a lot of shots and lost a lot of games. He averaged over 14 points per game his first two seasons, but he shot under 44% from the field in both of those seasons including 31% and 36% from three. Everything changed after his second season because the Cavs welcomed back Lebron James and it was time for Kyrie and Dion to go to school and learn how to win. Dion Waiters lasted 33 games before GM Lebron decided to trade Dion away in a deal that brought Cleveland JR Smith and Iman Shumpert and sent Dion Waiters to Oklahoma City. Waiters did well in Oklahoma City, but the Thunder decided to let him leave via free agency. It seemed as if Dion Waiters might be out of the league, but like so many before him Dion ended up with the Miami Heat and had a great season.
In terms of offense, Waiters is a throw back in many ways. He is an isolation heavy two guard that likes to take a lot of shots in the mid range. It is no coincidence that he had his best season and averaged career lows in number of shots between three feet and the three point line. Waiters took almost 67% of his shots at the rim and from the three point line. He shot decently at the rim, but he shoot a career best from three, with almost 40%. It will be interesting to see if Waiters can replicate that success from three this year. Without the three point shot falling, Waiters may not be a great player to have on the floor. He re-signed with Miami this summer and Waiters and the Heat have a great deal of confidence that he can help them get back to the playoffs and be a tough out for one of the top four East teams. The Heat do not really have any players as dynamic as Waiters. As much as I do dislike his game sometimes, Waiters has a knack of getting to the rim and he can make difficult shots. The Heat have had success with Waiters because they have helped him realize that he needs to shoot more threes and not take too many shots away from the rim. Although not a great defender in Cleveland, Waiters is playing hard and defending for Miami. Waiters has a chance to be very good for the Heat. If he has a great season, I could see the Heat as the five or six seed in the East with a legitimate chance to upset someone in the playoffs. If he struggles, the Heat might have trouble getting into the playoffs. To have your franchise's fate rest with Dion Waiters aka Google Me aka Headache aka Downhill Dion aka Kobe Wade is a scary thought, but Miami is a strange place.
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The Miami Heat had an amazing season finishing the season strong. At the end of 2016, the Heat were 10-24 seemingly headed for a high lottery pick, but in 2017 they went 31-17 missing the playoffs due to a tie breaker with the Bulls that went Chicago's way. They did this behind the play of Goran Dragic and Hassan Whiteside, in addition to the contributions of role players like Dion Waiters, Tyler Johnson, James Johnson, Luke Babbitt, and Justise Winslow. They had big aspirations for the summer as they were close to getting Gordon Hayward, but they missed out and instead brought back some of their free agents including James Johnson and Dion Waiters. Both players had career years last year and got 4 year deals for 60 million and 52 million respectively.
Paying Dion Waiters is scary as Zach Lowe and Tom Haberstroh mentioned on the Lowe Post, but it is high risk, high reward in my opinion. Waiters is a feast or famine type player. He can carry your offense for a whole game or he can torpedo your team. With Spoelstra coaching, I feel that Dion Waiters is going to continue to produce. He had one of the best seasons of his career with Miami and there is hope that he can continue to flourish playing opposite Dragic in the backcourt. He is a solid defensive player and he can get you buckets in isolation. He shot almost 40% from three and if he can duplicate that for your team, 13 million does not look so bad. It will be interesting to see how he does for a whole season with the Heat. James Johnson was a safer bet in my opinion. By all accounts, he is a great teammate and a good guy. He raved last season about Miami's culture and how they had helped him get into the best shape of his life. He played great for them last season and if he can continue to play at a high level he is the perfect big for today's NBA. He rebounds, he can do good stuff on the offensive end, but defensively he is great. He can switch onto wings and he can bang down low. It will be interesting if the Heat decide to start him next to Whiteside next year or if they continue to bring him off the bench. I think he fits with Whiteside nicely. Miami's big move this summer is the signing of Kelly Olynyk from the Celtics for 4 years and 50 million dollars. Olynyk comes off a good season with the Celtics where he had the game of his life in game 7 against the Wizards, but was not asked to come back to the Celtics to make room for Hayward. Olynyk will thrive in Miami in my opinion. He shoots it well with a career three point percentage of 37%. He is also surprisingly effective in the pick and roll, which will allow him to play well with Dragic, but in lineups with Whiteside, he is a competent floor spacer. Boston and Miami are somewhat similar offensively with the biggest difference being that Olynyk never played with a quality big in the post like Whiteside. Spoelstra has an interesting decision in that do you start Olynyk next to Whiteside or do you bring him off the bench? Defensively, Olynyk is not great. He struggles to defend in isolation and in the post, but if he is able to play with a great shot blocker like Whiteside or an elite defender like Johnson at all times it might help soften the blow of his defense. Overall, I like Miami's moves and I think that they might not be able to crack a top 4 seed in the East, but there are a team I would not want to play. Whiteside will have a field day against a lot of the Eastern Conference teams that do not have a lot of length up front. I feel that Miami could compete with any team in the East in a 7 game series. They have shooters, a good point guard, and a game changer in the post. Spoelstra has a lot of interesting choices to make before the season starts. |
AuthorDennis Dow Archives
October 2017
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