My Thank You Letter To a Heat/NBA Legend..Pat Riley

[HeatFanSince87]

This is my Thank You Letter to Riles!

From day one Riley came here in that summer of 95, until now, I have never doubted the man..ever! He brought character, respect, class and a real sense of us belonging when he got to the Heat. We may have been a franchise for 7 seasons prior, and even 2 playoff series, but I will say this franchise really took off in 1995 into the upper portion of the NBA. We became a title contender almost the day he arrived vs the expansion team.

Not only did this man as GM bring in our cornterstone in Zo, he brings in a "washed up" Timmy mid season, to tag team with our franchise center for the next 5-6 years! Then the following summer, picks up the perfect player for our system in PJ Brown, finds Vo Lenard, and signs Thunder Dan. Then mid season brings in Mash..

So in basically one year, he took the Heat from a 35 win team to, a 61 win team


Before Riley summer of 95

pg-Bimbo Coles
sg-Glen Rice
c-Matt Geiger
pf-Kevin Willis
sf-Billy Owens

Mid season of 96

pg-Timmy
sg-Lenard, Thunder
c-Zo
pf-Brown
sf-Mash

Lol...how he did that is beyond me! Anyone who questions this mans GM skills is a fool! We may have not won it all during the time with this team, but we contended every year, and won 4 division titles!

Then, he manages to snag EJ and BG(yes, he did over paid, but it would have been worth it had Zo not got sick.

In my mind, if Zo doesnt get sick, we win the championship! We still won 50 games that season for crying out loud! One Zo got sick, the blue print fell apart obviously. So, vs resigning players to maybe get an 8th seed, he let Mason, Timmy, Bowen and Thunder leave for basically nothing. I still remember him getting BASHED in the media for this. And I always respected him for this. He said "I will not compromise the future of this franchise for a shot a maybe a playoff team". So we rebuilt(again) and in 2 years we added Caron, Rasual, Lamar, Wade, Haslem and Skip..while Mason, Timmy, Thunder were all out of the NBA basically! Everyone wants to bash the guy for handing the team over to SVG, but my god, he brought in Lamar and Wade to go with Caron, it wasnt like he was handing over a team without potential for crying out loud!

He manages to swip Shaq away from LA, without giving up Wade! Then manages to snag JDub, Posey and Walker for EJ and Rausal??!! My god, hate on them all you want, but that was a steal at the time.

He takes over a dysfuctional team, that EVERYONE..EVERYONE other then Heat fans hated on all year, and motivates the us against them with his 15 strong..and we win the title, when alot had us even losing to NJ in round 2, let alone the Pistons and Mavs were going to destroy us!

Yes, we all know how last year turned out. Riley may have trusted the "turn on" factor too much..but I recall as all year saying, we will win when it matters. As far as this year, a disaster. But what cracks me up is people want to hate on Riley cause he took some games off to scout? He id the President and in charge of getting players! The guy admittley has said he lost a step as coach..so what!??!! It's expected of players, but not legendary coaches? The guy has been a head coach for 28 years, won 5 rings, god knows how many conference and division titles...and he cant get burnt out? At least he knows when its time to walk

And, again what kills me, just like he left Stan with a stable of talent. He leaves Erik with the same. He is getting ripped for walking away from a 15 win team..come on. We all know this team could improve like 25 games just from a healthy wade and Marion all year!

I doubt a young rookie coach could do much worse then Wade, Marion, God willing Rose or Beasly, Haslem, Wright, Cook etc...lol. Right off the bat, you got a franchise player, and likely 2 all-stars in the weak east, where Atl is tied up with boston 2-2 and had 37 wins!

In the end, Riley, as a Heat die hard, this is one fan who appreciates and knows everything you have done and will hopefully continue to do with this franchise. You may have made some bad calls(Anthony Carter, Brent Barry)but in the end your postives were like 2300 to 1! HAHA!

In the end..IN RILEY WE TRUST! Thank you for everything!

[Number34]

Well said!

[Hoops23]

I'm glad there are a lot of people value Riley's works. I'm sure he will be valued more when he resign to his role as President.

Michael Jordan retired twice and I have no doubts I will see Pat on the sidelines again and I assume its not with the Heat.

Thanks Pat, not just for what you did with the Heat and the players but for those inspiring/brain informing quotes, motivations & speeches. You're trully an motivator & inspiration to many.