The Miami Heat are showing everyone the perfect way to reflect negative attention; just blame your coach. A grand entrance, fireworks show, an hour-long primetime free agency signing and millions of dollars result in a pathetic record and an angry city.
Lebron James (left), Dwayne Wade (middle), and Chris Bosh (right) are finding that things aren’t so sunny in Miami with the Heat off to a 10-8 start under head coach Erik Spoelstra.
Miami Heat head coach Erik Spoelstra is facing heavy scrutiny from the players within the organization and is about to experience a mutiny if things don’t improve rapidly. Oh, how quickly things can change from an offseason fiesta to an opening season riot.
Certainly injuries have played a factor, and “the big three” are being hurt by the lack of production from the center and point guard positions, but these are just excuses. 328 million dollars should not result in a near-even record, and especially when that money belongs to the kind of talent that Miami has. How quickly the king has become the court jester.
A dynasty was already in place before anything meaningful occurred. The team came together from their 2008 gold medal Olympic squad and promised to show the prominence everyone thought they had. It wasn’t a question if the Heat would win a championship with this team, but how many championships this team would win.
Before they can come close to matching the Boston Celtic’s eight straight championships, or make a run similar to Jimmie Johnson’s current streak of five straight NASCAR championships, they’re going to need to win one. And before they can win a championship they’re going to need to improve right now.
It wouldn’t be surprising to see Spoelstra out as the head coach by the time you’re reading this. LeBron James can get coaches kicked off the team, but he can’t win championships, something he gets paid to do. Spoelstra has unfortunately become the scapegoat in this situation. Because his players don’t know how to execute, he has to face the penalty. On any other team that would be the case, but James, Dwayne Wade and Chris Bosh don’t need a lesson in execution, they’re beyond being coached. So how could this be the coaches fault?
Removing the head coach will only turn the attention away for a short amount of time. If their record doesn’t improve fans are going to start blaming the real culprits. Everyone expected greatness, even perfection. The Heat were supposed to make a run at the most wins in the regular season, now they’re just trying to maintain a decent playoff spot. It’s still early in the season, and letting the coach go could ignite the Heat and their stars to play better, but that shouldn’t be the case. After Spoelstra and James’ chest bump and “good talk,” everything from a public relations standpoint appears fine, but the truth is far from that.
The Boston Celtics and the Orlando Magic still sit atop the Eastern Conference, something that neither team was worried about losing when they learned Bosh and James signed with the Heat. Boston defeated them opening night to spoil their opening act, then traveled to Miami and beat them again. The Heat are 1-6 against teams with better records than them at the moment, their lone win against the Orlando Magic.
The Heat need a spark to light their fire and letting Spoelstra go may be it. They can’t continue at this rate for much longer before the better teams start pulling away, but a mediocre record isn’t his fault. Let’s see some of these star athletes step up for their lackluster performance; isn’t a king supposed to be noble?
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