Heat Check-Up

Can LeBron, Dwayne, and Chris continue to Lead Miami and eventually pass the Celtics for the top of the East?

July 8th 2010 would be a historic day in NBA History. It was one of the most highly anticipated free agent signings of all time. People in 2008 were talking about the summer of '10 because all of the 2003 rookies who are now big named superstars plus some other all stars would all be on the free agent market; the most famous though? LeBron James. Which team would land LeBron James

The day before, July 7th 2010 the Miami Heat signed star power forward Chris Bosh. This signing came a few days after the Heats leader, Dwayne Wade resigned an extension to play in Wade County.

Many teams were looking forward to July 8th though. All of them nervous but excited at the same time. The Knicks, Heat, Cavs, Nets and Clippers all believed they had a chance at LeBron James.

At the end of the ESPN Special though, only one team came out victorious, the Miami Heat.

The Heat were the most highly anticipated teams ever after signing 3 big superstars to all wear the same jerseys on the same court this season. People were saying how they could give the 1990's Chicago Bulls a run for their money on the best single season record ever.

So how are those Heat doing now?

Not to bad.

After 30 games the Heat are 21-9. They are atop the Eastern Conference's Southeast division. In perspective of all the teams in the Eastern Conference, they rank 2nd, just 3 games behind the Boston Celtics who in 2008 were the topic of many NBA discussions after they landed 3 superstars in Garnett, Allen, and Pierce.

Before they lost last night, the Heat had a 12 game win streak. They are averaging 100 points a game and have a great defense only giving up 90 which gives them a 10+- ratio.

The Heat are actually playing great ball, the thing that is keeping them from atop the power rankings though is how good people expected them to be. I mean seriously people, its not like Superman, Batman, and Flash are playing against a bunch of gym rats. It's professionals playing professionals.

In the 30 games so far, Wade has lead the team in scoring in 12 games. In those 12, the team is 11-1 with their only loss being against the Hornets by 3. At the Time though the Hornets were red hot and undefeated. LeBron has lead the team in scoring 11 times. The team is 7-4. And finally Bosh. Bosh has lead the team in scoring 2 times but the team is 2-0.

That leads me to my next point.

Throughout the season, i have noticed a few things by the Heat.

First off, they are not beating the Bulls record of 72-10. They already have 9 losses so their chances are under 1%. The other thing i noticed is that in all of the Heat's losses, they are not getting enough production from the Big 3. Always 1 guy is off in their losses. This man is usually Chris Bosh.

Although Bosh was probably the most happy about the teams formation, he has not been on top of his game. He has lead the team in scoring only 2 games but has still taken close to the number of shots. He also is not getting it done on defense. Bosh's rebounds per game have dropped too, and he's supposed to be the Big Man On Campus. Bosh is averaging about 18 points and 8 rebounds. His season but last year he averaged 24 and 10. Yes i understand he was the only arguably good player on his team last year, but he is still getting around the same amout of touches for scoring, and for rebounding he is just getting boxed out.

Still combined the Big 3 have combined for over 75% of the teams total offense. This is good because due to injuries from their other players like Haslem and Miller, the Heat were lacking depth in their lineup, making Bosh, Wade, and James play a lot of minutes per game.

Still don't get me wrong, the Heat are playing great ball.

The thing they can argue with the Bulls about is that there weren't as many good teams in the NBA back then. This year and in past years, the league has gotten much more talented where each team has a core of good players. The Eastern Conference has many tough teams in the Magic, Celtic, Bulls, and Knicks while the West has the big 3 of the Lakers, Spurs, and Mavs, and also the uprising Thunder.

If the Heat can continue to spread the wealth evenly and play efficient basketball, they should have no problem staying in the top 5 teams in the league. Also if they let Chris Bosh lead the team in scoring in every game they actually might beat the Bulls 72-10 record haha.

The Heat are one of the most exciting teams in the league and I'm looking forward to attending their game on the 28th vs the Knicks in Miami. Maybe the Knicks will get some revenge when the Heat beat the Knicks earlier this month at MSG. The Knicks hung in there but in the 2nd half started to play worse and eventually lost the game by 20.

For all you Knick fans, i will be posting an article about how the 2010 Knicks with Amare, Chandler, Gallo, and Ray may remind a few of the Championship winning Knicks teams with Reed, Frazier, Dave Debusschere and Earl the Pearl .