No more rumors. No more leverage. No more hypotheticals.
The Miami Heat got their superstar, and his name is Giannis Antetokounmpo.
The team sent Milwaukee a package of Tyler Herro, Kel’el Ware, Jaime Jaquez Jr, and Kasparas Jakucionis as well as a bunch of draft capital, which included 3 first round picks including pick 13, 1 pick swap, and 1 second rounder.
To land a star as big as Antetokounmpo, the deal has to hurt a little bit when sending these players out. But the excitement of what is to come for Erik Spoelstra and his staff over the next few months should be the current storyline.
So let’s take a step back from the rest of the roster or regular season standing predictions and just talk some hoops. How will Antetokounmpo be utilized under Spoelstra in Miami this year?
First up you are adding some elite half-court hoops. The guy is a walking paint touch and can generate it from so many spots on the floor.
One of the most relied upon sources will be these normal 1-on-1 face-up attacks off the bounce. He has the strides and burst to get past that initial line of defense before the help comes, but more importantly he has the strength and physicality inside to really finish at the rim.
High flying dunks, easy fingerrolls, and crafty spins and footwork. That’s all on display when that freight train starts heading downhill.
Starting over with a new roster also means starting over with a new offensive structure.
The Heat scrapped their offense last season with a new look isolation and screen-less style that came out the gate hot early in the season before teams began to adjust.
With that said, pick and rolls are back in Miami.
Help defense and doubles are already being sent at Antetokounmpo as you’re reading this, and one of the easiest and simplest ways to eliminate scheduled attention is by using him as a roller.
Short roll stuff for Antetokounmpo is so much more deadly than other players due to the fact he can rise up and launch toward the rim from pretty much anywhere around that dotted line.
Lob opportunities will be there, but even funtional pick and rolls with his play-making flashing to that strong side corner that Bam Adebayo will be occupying can be imagined already.
But there are two sides to a pick and roll. And Giannis Antetokounmpo is both of them.
Inverted pick and rolls are a term that many Heat fans should e familiar with, considering there’s been a lot of clamoring for Adebayo to get more of those reps over the years.
Guard screen with a big guy handling is just a massive headache for any defense, and it creates tons of mismatches on the floor.
Even more headaches and mismatches when you are a 6’11, 245 pound freak of nature.
Get ready to see a whole lot of these actions with somebody like Davion Mitchell setting a brush screen, and ideally whatever shooter they end up bringing in over the next few weeks.
So we know the built in attributes that come with acquiring Antetokounmpo, but what are some of the factors that’ll be even more important in Miami?
The first one is spacial awareness and cutting.
Sort of like they did with Jimmy Butler, Erik Spoelstra will just allow Antetokounmpo to go do what he does. Fill up space, be physical, and orchestrate the spacing due to the attention he sees.
When he gets a running start into a cut, it’s wraps. Just that simple.
His dunker spot sitting, baseline cutting, and like I said, normal catch and go’s on the perimeter will be a huge storyline for the Heat this season.
To add onto this topic, his passing is the other area of importance. Mid-post reads and skips, looking for cutters, and the big one, finding shooters on the move as the defense collapses.
Miami now shifts their focus to finding some of those shooters, but I’ll just say it was a good time for the Heat’s captain to truly unlock that unhinged three ball.
Lastly, the Miami Heat have a flickering switch of pace at their disposal.
When you think of Antetokounmpo’s scoring, your first thought probably goes to those long strides on a fastbreak with the ball out in front of him before throwing down a viscious slam.
If you turn the ball over or he notices his team’s jersey has a numbers advantage, yeah, he will make you pay.
But it’s not all just gas when it comes to Antetokounmpo.
The true beauty of adding a number one option at this level is that they have a guy that can also control the game in the half-court and slow a game down.
The Heat have been missing that since the departure of Butler. A hard drive during a cold stretch to get to that free throw line and get the other four guys back in order to find a rhythm.
Erik Spoelstra and the Heat won’t be reinventing the wheel. The primary goal game-plan wise over the next few months will be to make Giannis Antetokounmpo as comfortable in this system as possible.
The best way to do that? Go let Giannis Antetokounmpo be Giannis Antetokounmpo.
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