Considering how much discussion there was about the Heat and their potential moves during the 2023 offseason, very little has changed for them nearing the 2023-24 season. That’s not necessarily a bad thing – they did, of course, just make the NBA Finals, but they were also only the eight seed and probably wouldn’t have been too upset if they had managed to find a way to accomodate Damian Lillard’s move to Miami.
Alas, they didn’t, and the roster they will head into the new season with is much the same as that which helped them knock off the Bucks, the Knicks and then the Celtics in last season’s playoffs. Despite losing Max Strus, the Heat have still got plenty of depth in the back court and on the wings, and the result is there will likely be one or two decent NBA players struggling for minutes, assuming no injuries. But there is one whose preseason might be particularly important; a player who has been very valuable for the team in the past, but has work to do to prove he still has that capability.
Duncan Robinson’s 2022-23 season was, for the most part, an unmitigated disaster. A man whose value is derived virtually entirely from his outside shooting ability, he hit just 32.8% of his long-range attempts throughout the course of the regular season, continuing a trend which saw his three-point shooting percentage go from 44.6%, to 40.8%, to 37.2% over the three seasons prior.
Robinson is a defensive liability, and though he’s improved his ability to make the occasional play off the dribble, he still needs to be hitting his threes – particularly given he’s guaranteed more than $18 million over each of the next two seasons, and a third with a player option.
Of course, come last season’s postseason, the Robinson of old returned, mirroring the improved performance of virtually each of his teammates. He started off by hitting 14 of his 19 long-range attempts in the Milwaukee series, and by the end of the playoffs had hit 50 threes at 44.2%. That’s the kind of Robinson that coach Spo will happily give minutes to.