Miami Heat Preseason Conference 2008

[logpmess]

Welcome everyone. We will talk in brief about our past year, our offseason, and our upcoming year.

Last year, we were bad. We paid big money for the likes of Shaquille O'neal, and he did not produce at the amount we had hoped. We also moved a naturally based center to power forward in the case of Al Jefferson. We had an overachieving point guard past his prime in Allen Iverson. We had an underachieving shooting guard in Monta Ellis before his prime. And we had our stalwart, Lebron. We sucked.

This offseason saw us decline options on both Shaq and Iverson. I did not feel that they would produce this upcoming year at the level of their respective contracts. We, also, saw us drop some in the Draft Lottery. We expected a drop, because we had been lucky in the past (Lebron James). We did not expect as big of a drop as we got. We, also, were hopeful that one of the point guards would fall to us in the draft. DeAndre Jordan is a franchise player that I did not think 4 other teams would pass on. We really had our eyes on two players: Russell Westbrook and Goran Dragic. We felt that we would definitely have the chance to get one of those two players. We were wrong. At that time, the Miami Heat franchise decided that our team needed a quantity pick rather than a 3rd solid player at the center position. We traded down and in return we got Jared Dudley. Some reporters have called Dudley "the type of player that gets a GM fired." I don't understand this when he is only in his second year. We also pulled the plug on the Monta Ellis experiment. We decided that win now approach is what this town needs. We traded a young and budding player in Monta for an established veteran in Baron Davis. We haven't had a point guard the caliber of Davis here since Gary Payton. Serge Ibaka is the player selected with our newly acquired pick. He is raw offensively, but his defensive ability will prove essential for our run throughout this year.

In RFA, we made a meager bid on our one player in Al Jefferson. He unfortunately chose the money, so we ended up matching the offer sheet to what we see as a huge impact player on this team for years to come. In free agency, we didn't make a splash at all, because we feel that our team is as complete as it will be this year already. Training camp was pretty good overall. A lot of jumps up which is to be expected from a young team. The biggest jump surprise is to Hawes' potential. The biggest drop surprise is to Ibaka's block (down 10). That is why we bought insurance for him.

This upcoming season, we expect the following lineup:
C- Al Jefferson
PF - Serge Ibaka
SF - Lebron James
SG - Jared Dudley
PG - Baron Davis

We are expecting a mid-tier playoff berth and hope we can make a run in the playoffs. The floor is open to any questions.

[JNR]

GWR: In a star studded lineup, it appears to me that Jared Dudley is your glue guy. What does he bring to your team?

[logpmess]

GWR: In a star studded lineup, it appears to me that Jared Dudley is your glue guy. What does he bring to your team?

He brings a scoring threat without needing the ball in his hands. It's going to be a way to stretch the floor to allow Lebron to drive and Baron to distribute to the rest of the team.

[Xist2Inspire]

Random Reporter: Now that you have playoff aspirations, are you concerned that the rookie Ibaka will have a hard time adjusting to the league as a starter? Are there any backup plans in place if that happens?

[logpmess]

Random Reporter: Now that you have playoff aspirations, are you concerned that the rookie Ibaka will have a hard time adjusting to the league as a starter? Are there any backup plans in place if that happens?

We are confident that Ibaka will fit in just fine as a starter. If it comes down to it, we have fairly high aspirations for Shelden Williams to step in to that spot, or worse comes to worst, we can move Jefferson back down to the 4 and have a rotation at the 5 spot.

[kucoach7]

Davis is significantly older than your other core players. If things don't go well, will he be on the move?

[ballsohard]

Would you say that Lebron has lived up to the hype of the media so far in a Miami Heat uniform?


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[logpmess]

Davis is significantly older than your other core players. If things don't go well, will he be on the move?

He is significantly older, but we have lacked a veteran presence in his prime to lead this team. Everyone is always available to move. It really just depends on offers.


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[logpmess]

Would you say that Lebron has lived up to the hype of the media so far in a Miami Heat uniform?


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Yes and no. Has he brought us championships, no. Has he constantly been the leader and superstar of this team, yes.


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