Make No Mistake, the Heat are Going to be Good.

When "The Decision" aired and LeBron announced he was going to be signing with Miami, joining Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh as perhaps the best Big 3 of all time, much was made about how they would have trouble filling the roster with smaller contracts, and that the egos would clash (If you think that, you haven't watched the Olympics and seen the chemistry between these players, especially James and Wade).

But frankly, the Heat have done a marvelous job surrounding LeBron, Wade and Bosh with very good role players this offseason.  The biggest things they needed were shooters to take advantage of Wade and James penetration, and a rim defender to stop opposing big men from dominating on that end.  Let's take a look at what they've managed to do.


After re-signing Wade, and bringing in James and Bosh, the Heat roster stood at 5 players: Mario Chalmers, Dwyane Wade, LeBron James, Chris Bosh, and Michael Beasley.  The league minimum required is 13 players.  The Heat also drafted three 2nd round picks in the draft: Dexter Pittman, Jarvis Varnado, and Da'Sean Butler.  2nd round picks aren't guaranteed contracts, but Miami retained the option to sign them.

The first thing Miami did was to trade Michael Beasley to Minnesota for a 2011 2nd round pick, as well as a swap of a future first round picks.  This created the cap space the Heat needed to sign Mike Miller, a sharpshooter with a career average of 40.5% from downtown, and with Wade, James, and Bosh on the team, he'll get plenty of open opportunities.  Roster: 5 players

Then Miami re-signed Udonis Haslem, one of the more underrated defenders in the league, who can play the 4 or the 5 in a pinch, despite only being around 6'8".  He's also an above average rebounder, and is good for a solid 10 points, although he won't be asked to score much on this team.  More importantly, Haslem was a key roleplayer on the 2006 Championship winning Heat, and knows what it takes to win.  Roster: 6 players.

The next step for Miami was to sign big men Zydrunas Ilgauskas and Juwan Howard.  Both men are well past their primes, but are veterans that know how to play their role, and they provided some much needed big man depth for the Heat.  Ilgauskas has a bit of an outside game as well, and that complements Wade and LeBron.  Roster: 8 players

Not content with just those big men, the Heat then re-signed shotblocker Joel Anthony, and signed 2nd round draft pick Dexter Pittman to contracts.  Anthony doesn't have any offensive game to speak of, but on this team, he won't need to score, and can content himself with just blocking shots, something he does on an exceptional level.  His rebounding is extremely poor though, so he might not start.  Pittman provides a lot of potential if he can get his conditioning right (he weighed somewhere between 300-400 pounds in college), but with the experience of playing for this team, he might just fulfill it (think Big Baby Davis learning from the Big 3 in Boston).  Roster: 10 players

The Heat began the off-season by buying out James Jones to create more cap space, but then ended up re-signing him, adding another good shooter to their wing depth (career 39.5% from 3).  Jamaal Magloire was also brought back from last season, adding yet another big man to the Heat depth list.  Magloire is a decent defender and rebounder but that's about it.  Still, on a bad team Magloire might and has started, and he provides quality depth at a cheap price.  Roster: 12 players

By now the Heat are lacking most at the point guard position, with Chalmers really being the only point guard on the team (although Wade and James will likely handle the ball the most.) Still, the Heat returned Carlos Arroyo on a cheap deal, giving them another ball handler.  This brings their roster to the minimum. Roster: 13 players

The Heat continue on their re-signing spree, bringing back PF Shavlik Randolph.  Now the team that was desperately lacking for big man depth has more big men than they know what to do with.  This signing is pure insurance on Miami's part, as Randolph only managed to play 3 games for last year's Heat team.  This year, he'll be another body in practice and that's about it.   Roster: 14 players

In the last few days the Heat have also added a couple more guards: D-Leaguer Kenny Hasbrouck and Eddie House.  Hasbrouck shot 38.1% from downtown in the D-League last year and House is an NBA veteran who knows how to contribute to a Championship caliber team, and can definitely knock down the open 3 (career 39%).  With these two signings, the Heat are over the maximum limit of players, and its likely that either Randolph or Hasbrouck will be cut during training camp.  My money's on Randolph because of all the big men the Heat have now. Roster: 16 players

So after this crazy offseason for the Heat, their depth chart now stands at this:

PG: Mario Chalmers, Carlos Arroyo, Eddie House, Kenny Hasbrouck
SG: Dwyane Wade, James Jones
SF: LeBron James, Mike Miller
PF: Chris Bosh, Udonis Haslem, Juwan Howard, Shavlik Randolph
C: Zydrunas Ilgauskas, Joel Anthony, Jamaal Magloire, Dexter Pittman

The player(s) that will be cut likely won't make much of a difference in the long run, but that is a deep team.  The Heat got exactly the type of players they wanted to complement James, Wade and Bosh, and at a cheap price too.  This looks like a team to me that can win the championship this year, and I will not be surprised to see this team in the NBA Finals for the next several years.  The only teams I see in the league with comparable depth are the Los Angeles Lakers and maybe the Orlando Magic (less stars, better complementary players).

If Pat Riley doesn't win Executive of the Year, I will be very, very surprised.