Nothing proved as disastrous in the NBA last year as Miami Heat giving Duncan Robinson a $90 million deal. Maybe the Lakers trading for Westbrook did, but that’s debatable.
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Although the 2021-22 Miami Heat made it much further in the postseason than the one in 2020-21, they would have much to think about this year because 50% of their core has proven itself liability in the playoffs. We are talking about the core of Jimmy Butler, Bam Adebayo, Tyler Herro, and Duncan Robinson. The latter two have been huge talking points in Miami since the 2022 playoffs started.
Two of the most essential guys in Miami’s offense of the past three seasons couldn’t contribute many meaningful minutes throughout their postseason campaign that saw them eliminate Trae Young’s Hawks and then Joel Embiid and James Harden-led 76ers only to lose the Conference Finals to the Celtics in 7 games.
As we speak, the Heat management might be looking for viable options to move their pair of lethal shooters who were nothing more than a traffic cone (in Patrick Beverly’s words) on defense.
Thoughts? pic.twitter.com/PFu4xc8FCK
— EasternConfMuse (@EastConfMuse) May 25, 2022
It was one thing if Robinson would just be bad on defense but had a regular anywhere close to Herro – the 2022 Sixth Man of the Year. But he had a tremendous drop in efficiency and saw at least six lesser minutes per game than the previous season and almost 20 minutes lesser in the postseason.
— Establish The Run NBA (@EstablishRunNBA) July 23, 2020
Duncan Robinson cost Miami Heat close to what Stephen Curry cost the Warriors
After signing a 5-year $90 million/year contract following two-straight prolifically efficient seasons, Robinson and Erik Spoelstra in their wildest of dreams, wouldn’t have thought they would be here.
But following a post-season that saw one of Heat’s most crucial rotation guys see 12 minutes per game and 5 DNPs which includes the 4-point loss in Game 7 of the Conference Finals, he would be lucky if he is still in Miami for the upcoming season.
NBA Reddit helped us get our attention to how much each of his points and 3-pointers throughout the season cost the team, and it’ll blow your mind.
Duncan’s 11 PPG (regular season) and 5.6 PPG (post-season) cost $21,000 per point to his team. To put that in perspective, Stephen Curry (26 PPG), who was the highest-paid player in the league this season, costs around $21K per point to the Dubs.