Hassan Whiteside: Road To The Max

[afour495+]

I feel like Hassan getting slighted for dpoy will make him become an even better defensive anchor for us in the playoffs. He'll use that chip on his shoulder as motivation.

[Prince Ali]

I think we need to move away from this narrative that because a guy makes a certain amount of money he has to start. If Bosh can play next year, why can't he come off the bench and still have a positive impact on the team?

[GameTime_3]

I think we need to move away from this narrative that because a guy makes a certain amount of money he has to start. If Bosh can play next year, why can't he come off the bench and still have a positive impact on the team?

At this point with Bosh, he is a reserve untill proven healthy. Love the guy but hes scoring, play making could be a huge asset off the bench. Hassan allows us to go small without going to small as Hassan cleans the glass.

[heat4life]

I think we need to move away from this narrative that because a guy makes a certain amount of money he has to start. If Bosh can play next year, why can't he come off the bench and still have a positive impact on the team?

At this point with Bosh, he is a reserve untill proven healthy. Love the guy but hes scoring, play making could be a huge asset off the bench. Hassan allows us to go small without going to small as Hassan cleans the glass.

Tricky though. With all the respect Wade deserves, Bosh is our best two-way player when healthy. Our best shot would be to make the Bosh/Whiteside front court work. I agree with what someone else said, it would not be that big of an issue if we can get a SF that is an outside threat.

[GameTime_3]

I think we need to move away from this narrative that because a guy makes a certain amount of money he has to start. If Bosh can play next year, why can't he come off the bench and still have a positive impact on the team?

At this point with Bosh, he is a reserve untill proven healthy. Love the guy but hes scoring, play making could be a huge asset off the bench. Hassan allows us to go small without going to small as Hassan cleans the glass.

Tricky though. With all the respect Wade deserves, Bosh is our best two-way player when healthy. Our best shot would be to make the Bosh/Whiteside front court work. I agree with what someone else said, it would not be that big of an issue if we can get a SF that is an outside threat.

Very tricky...i agree but Bosh is more suited for bench than Hassan. Bosh understands the game, has a bit less ego, has already proven everything and gives us the best 6 man in the NBA by a very large margin. Bosh is your 4/5 big. The NBA is changing, small ball is what is going on now, 3's are 4's, which is why Deng has flourished. Being on bench will also allow HEAT to sit Bosh on long flights or whenever they need too.

[gom]

I also think the most important time to figure out Bosh's situation is this off season. If there are any health concerns and he sits out next year, we need to request from the league the injury exception early enough in the FA season so that we are able to get a valuable player to sign here before everyone has signed somewhere else. I saw this happen when Amare was in PHX and he had to sit our 2 years because of micro fracture surgery. Insurance covers the salary if the player has been ruled out for the year, so the hit on the business side would not hurt us. We just need to be able to move quick to sign someone else. This is why Hassan needs to be signed right away, it send a clear message to the other FA's out there who want to win.

The Disabled Player Exception is limited to the Mid Level Exception. That value next year is $5,628,000. Also, we should request that exception after our free agents are signed or it counts against the cap space.

One scenario:

1. Sign Wade (must be signed first because of his huge cap hold)
2. Sign Whiteside
3. Finish signing any free agents to use cap space.
4. Sign TJ with Early Bird exception (his cap hold is only a little more than $1M)
5. Use the Disabled Player Exception to sign another player.
6. Sign other players with veteran's minimum.

Here are my calculations in two charts. The first shows our situation after spending cap space on Whiteside (at max), Wade (3/45), and Deng (the rest). The second shows our situation after signing TJ with Early Bird exception. I'd target Joe Johnson with the DPE, fwiw. I think we can convince him to play for this vastly reduced salary for 1 year. It does not confer bird rights, but that shouldn't be a problem with the cap leaping so fast.



We would have to count on Winslow, Richardson, TJ, and Whiteside improving more than Deng, Wade, and Joe falling off. Note that I also added Liggins to the team as a bench player. At 38 & 40, I'd target players like James Webb III or Thon Maker (if he falls out of the first round - a real possibility). If we can get a draft & stash pick, I'd use it on Aleksandar Vezenkov.

Note that if Bosh returns we can release any player. It doesn't have to be Joe Johnson because of the DPE. So we can sign 16 players instead of 15 with league permission. I think there is a good chance this happens, fwiw.

[Durrrtysouth]

At this point with Bosh, he is a reserve untill proven healthy. Love the guy but hes scoring, play making could be a huge asset off the bench. Hassan allows us to go small without going to small as Hassan cleans the glass.

Tricky though. With all the respect Wade deserves, Bosh is our best two-way player when healthy. Our best shot would be to make the Bosh/Whiteside front court work. I agree with what someone else said, it would not be that big of an issue if we can get a SF that is an outside threat.

Very tricky...i agree but Bosh is more suited for bench than Hassan. Bosh understands the game, has a bit less ego, has already proven everything and gives us the best 6 man in the NBA by a very large margin. Bosh is your 4/5 big. The NBA is changing, small ball is what is going on now, 3's are 4's, which is why Deng has flourished. Being on bench will also allow HEAT to sit Bosh on long flights or whenever they need too.

A little off topic, but I really don't understand this thing with Bosh and the long flights. Don't they charter a plane? Do they not have flatbed seats on the plane? If not, then get some. It's not like they are flying SoutWest Airlines. Sitting on a plane should not be such a health hazard. I fly 4x a week.

[gom]

Tricky though. With all the respect Wade deserves, Bosh is our best two-way player when healthy. Our best shot would be to make the Bosh/Whiteside front court work. I agree with what someone else said, it would not be that big of an issue if we can get a SF that is an outside threat.

Very tricky...i agree but Bosh is more suited for bench than Hassan. Bosh understands the game, has a bit less ego, has already proven everything and gives us the best 6 man in the NBA by a very large margin. Bosh is your 4/5 big. The NBA is changing, small ball is what is going on now, 3's are 4's, which is why Deng has flourished. Being on bench will also allow HEAT to sit Bosh on long flights or whenever they need too.

A little off topic, but I really don't understand this thing with Bosh and the long flights. Don't they charter a plane? Do they not have flatbed seats on the plane? If not, then get some. It's not like they are flying SoutWest Airlines. Sitting on a plane should not be such a health hazard. I fly 4x a week.

I think you will find the answer in the "endangerment" clause on Chris's insurance contract (the one that insures his salary will be paid if he must be released for health reasons.) It's a business. The Heat cannot cause any situation that can impact his condition or that $80M is kaput.

[RexBoyWonder]

At this point with Bosh, he is a reserve untill proven healthy. Love the guy but hes scoring, play making could be a huge asset off the bench. Hassan allows us to go small without going to small as Hassan cleans the glass.

Tricky though. With all the respect Wade deserves, Bosh is our best two-way player when healthy. Our best shot would be to make the Bosh/Whiteside front court work. I agree with what someone else said, it would not be that big of an issue if we can get a SF that is an outside threat.

Very tricky...i agree but Bosh is more suited for bench than Hassan. Bosh understands the game, has a bit less ego, has already proven everything and gives us the best 6 man in the NBA by a very large margin. Bosh is your 4/5 big. The NBA is changing, small ball is what is going on now, 3's are 4's, which is why Deng has flourished. Being on bench will also allow HEAT to sit Bosh on long flights or whenever they need too.

Assuming we mange the salaries (trading Mcbob, JJ discounted, Deng and Wade split ~24 Mil$), I can see something like :

Dragic/TJ/ Weber
Wade/Rich
JJ/Winslow
Deng(32 minutes)/Bosh(16 minutes)
Whiteside(34 minutes)/Bosh(14 minutes)

The only reason I see this as realistic is :

1.Deng is proving to be very valuable at PF in smallball NBA
2. Bosh is a true professional, his ego can handle starting off the bench and he'll sacrifice if he believes it helps us win.
3. Deng is a true professional, His ego can handle not closing out games if we want to play Bosh and Whiteside in crunch time.

[Bishop45]

I agree with what someone else said, it would not be that big of an issue if we can get a SF that is an outside threat.

If you mean me, then that's not exactly what I meant. Just someone who can lessen Bosh's role on offense and still let him be complimentary

Difficult part being, that if Bosh and Whiteside are going to coexist then one of them has to take the lionshare of touches, cause we can't feed both of them every night and it's already a task finding Whiteside most nights. Not impossible to make them work but not going to be easy, probably better to split them up

I feel like Hassan getting slighted for dpoy will make him become an even better defensive anchor for us in the playoffs. He'll use that chip on his shoulder as motivation.

3rd is very good, I've got no problems with that. Like Zach Lowe pointed out, he could easily be 3b with Paul Millsap(I give Hassan the edge), nothing wrong with third

[Heat_Fan_87]

[tweet]https://twitter.com/MyMikeCheck/status/722418185723621376[/tweet]
[tweet]https://twitter.com/MyMikeCheck/status/722418853431681025[/tweet]

[ndnow]

I think we need to move away from this narrative that because a guy makes a certain amount of money he has to start. If Bosh can play next year, why can't he come off the bench and still have a positive impact on the team?

Tell that to the boston redsox poor suckers.

[ndnow]

Haven't player's gotten past the starting stigma yet? I thought it was pretty well known now in the league that starting means absolutely nothing, it's who finishes the game and how many minutes you play. Rotations is where you make the bread, if Whiteside fits better with the players in the first rotation then he should start, if Bosh fits better then he should start. You don't force a player into a spot because he "should" start that is stupid.

[Heat3]

[tweet]https://twitter.com/MyMikeCheck/status/722418185723621376[/tweet]
[tweet]https://twitter.com/MyMikeCheck/status/722418853431681025[/tweet]

"It's a bit disappointing"....

Why shouldn't it be disappointing? He wants to be the best. If he has a great career these guys will point to things like this and praise him for his competitiveness. But today, there seems to still be a negative narrative about him.

[QUIZ]

I think we need to move away from this narrative that because a guy makes a certain amount of money he has to start. If Bosh can play next year, why can't he come off the bench and still have a positive impact on the team?

To win a title you need players to outperform their contracts. As it was he was barely justifying his contract. Paying a bench player $24mill is not how you build a winning team. If he's here to stay we need to figure out how to maximize his effectiveness and that mean playing 30+mpg.

[Flash4thewin]

Haven't player's gotten past the starting stigma yet? I thought it was pretty well known now in the league that starting means absolutely nothing, it's who finishes the game and how many minutes you play. Rotations is where you make the bread, if Whiteside fits better with the players in the first rotation then he should start, if Bosh fits better then he should start. You don't force a player into a spot because he "should" start that is stupid.

So its not who starts but who finished right?

If Bosh was healthy Spo would start and finish games with him. The length and speed at the C position not mention the 3pt range all work better with what Spo wants. Please remember we went out of our way to keep Whiteside on the bench even when it was clear he was leaps and bounds over performing Amare. The whole goal was to keep Whiteside as the backup and when Bosh our 2 time nba championship winner returns he would get back his starting spot. Spo has gone on the record saying he will ride and die with Wade, what makes anyone else think its any different with Bosh? Bosh who changed his game for Spo? Sometimes things are painfully obvious.

[BFRESH44]

Hassan is a person who is mentally incapable of filtering himself. He's going to have "cringe" moments.

And I actually prefer candidness from professional athletes, so I'm not gonna kill him for it. But his comments in light of not winning the award show the maturation process is still ongoing for him. He'll never be the most media savvy, so I'm not expecting that lol.


Still, I'm maxing the the **** out of him this summer.

[Tim_Hardawayy]

Haven't player's gotten past the starting stigma yet? I thought it was pretty well known now in the league that starting means absolutely nothing, it's who finishes the game and how many minutes you play. Rotations is where you make the bread, if Whiteside fits better with the players in the first rotation then he should start, if Bosh fits better then he should start. You don't force a player into a spot because he "should" start that is stupid.

So its not who starts but who finished right?

If Bosh was healthy Spo would start and finish games with him. The length and speed at the C position not mention the 3pt range all work better with what Spo wants. Please remember we went out of our way to keep Whiteside on the bench even when it was clear he was leaps and bounds over performing Amare. The whole goal was to keep Whiteside as the backup and when Bosh our 2 time nba championship winner returns he would get back his starting spot. Spo has gone on the record saying he will ride and die with Wade, what makes anyone else think its any different with Bosh? Bosh who changed his game for Spo? Sometimes things are painfully obvious.

First you agree and say that Bosh will end games. Then you go back and point to Amare, forgetting that Hassan still finished games and played way more minutes even while Amare started.

Also if the argument is Spo will keep Hassan from playing... who was it that decided to give some random kid from the D-League minutes in the first place?

Your arguments are all over the place, basically only designed to make it seem like everything Spo does is to our detriment and Hassan is some perfect angel and savior. Don't think I forgot you were 100% on Beasley's side, the guy who we gave 3 different chances to, and now can't even crack the Rockets rotation as they get walloped by the Warriors (I'm sure you'll argue that he'd be the difference maker).

[Tim_Hardawayy]

I think we need to move away from this narrative that because a guy makes a certain amount of money he has to start. If Bosh can play next year, why can't he come off the bench and still have a positive impact on the team?

To win a title you need players to outperform their contracts. As it was he was barely justifying his contract. Paying a bench player $24mill is not how you build a winning team. If he's here to stay we need to figure out how to maximize his effectiveness and that mean playing 30+mpg.

As to the Bosh thing, its gonna be rough. We're basically stuck with him. Part of me hopes that as long as he's happy, he can retire so we can clean up our books by the season after next, but I don't want him to feel forced out.

[ndnow]

Haven't player's gotten past the starting stigma yet? I thought it was pretty well known now in the league that starting means absolutely nothing, it's who finishes the game and how many minutes you play. Rotations is where you make the bread, if Whiteside fits better with the players in the first rotation then he should start, if Bosh fits better then he should start. You don't force a player into a spot because he "should" start that is stupid.

So its not who starts but who finished right?

If Bosh was healthy Spo would start and finish games with him. The length and speed at the C position not mention the 3pt range all work better with what Spo wants. Please remember we went out of our way to keep Whiteside on the bench even when it was clear he was leaps and bounds over performing Amare. The whole goal was to keep Whiteside as the backup and when Bosh our 2 time nba championship winner returns he would get back his starting spot. Spo has gone on the record saying he will ride and die with Wade, what makes anyone else think its any different with Bosh? Bosh who changed his game for Spo? Sometimes things are painfully obvious.

All I'm trying to say is play whatever rotations are best, whether that is Hassan, Bosh or even Haslem I don't care. If Hassan just get's buried in a lineup with DWade and JJ then why waste his time on the court, that is dumb. Use his energy with a unit where he can be more of a focus and have a greater impact. Same goes for Bosh, same goes for Tyler Johnson and everyone else on the team.

The Heat have very advanced team metric's they use to quantify the output of different unit's at different times of the game. You are thinking of things far to basically.