After a horrendous season, the Miami Heat could be forgiven for looking toward the upcoming NBA Draft.
Erik Spoelstra’s team is in need of a talent boost. Finding young, cost-controlled talent to come in an provide a spark could be a good way for the Heat to go. In a March 19 mock draft from The Athletic’s Sam Vecenie, the Heat landed 6-foot-3 guard Jase Richardson out of Michigan with the 10th overall pick.
“Richardson is one of the true breakout risers of this draft class, a player who rarely played on-ball in high school who has flourished this season getting more of those reps for Michigan State,” Vecenie wrote. “Few players navigate tight spaces quite like Richardson, as he has a Jalen Brunson-like ability to find creases in the defense with his pristine footwork… However, it’s his play in the last stretch of the season that has made believers out of most evaluators across the NBA. In his last 11 games, Richardson is averaging 17.3 points and shooting 50 percent from the field, 42 percent from 3 and 82 percent from the line while getting there five times per game.”
The guard position has been a problem area for Miami in recent years. The acquisition of Terry Rozier has failed to plug the gap. Rozier has struggled throughout his first full season on South Beach.
Heat Could Target Kasparas Jakucionis
Another guard the Heat could target in the upcoming draft is Kasparas Jakucionis. Bleacher Report’s Jonathan Wasserman has the multi-talented guard falling to Miami in his latest mock draft. For anyone unfamiliar with Jakucionis, here’s what Wasserman believes he could bring to the table.
“There is currently both optimism and debate about how much Kasparas Jakucionis’ positional size, clever maneuvering, shotmaking skill and passing IQ can offset his lack of explosiveness and quickness,” Wasserman wrote. “…Too much recent evidence suggests skill and IQ can outweigh athletic limitations for a ball-handler, particularly for a plus shooter. And despite a recent slump from behind the arc, there are years of promising shotmaking data/tape for scouts to go back to from Jakucionis’ time with Barcelona and Lithuania.”
Jakucionis is the type of shot-maker and shot-creator that Miami needs. If he’s available when it’s their turn to pick in the draft, he would be a high-value choice for the franchise.
Heat Currently Lack Competitiveness
According to Spoelstra, who was speaking via a March 15 postgame news conference, the Heat currently lacks a competitive spirit.
“We lost our competitive spirit there in the second half,” Spoelstra said. “Enough has been said in the locker room, but we have a certain standard of how we expect to play and compete. We did not meet that standard tonight. When we meet that standard, it doesn’t mean that we’re going to win, obviously, we’re struggling to figure out how to win games, but you know, last night (vs. the Boston Celtics), we met a standard from a competitive standpoint tonight, tonight we did not.”
Adding some fresh young talent is a surefire way to bring intensity to the roster. What rookies lack in polish and experience, they make up for with intensity and desire. So, while the Heat certainly needs some polish, adding a high-level rookie could work wonders, especially in the mid-to-long term.
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