Miami Heat: Is Kevin Durant still a needle-mover? | Five on the Floor

Miami Heat: Is Kevin Durant still a needle-mover? | Five on the Floor

welcome to the latest episode of Five on the Floor on the Five Reason Sports Network Thanks for joining us on your favorite podcast app on Apple Podcast or if you want to get a little quicker Spotify if you’re on Android Spotify or the Five Reasons YouTube channel Also check out Off the Floor That’s our Discord server It’s been really rolling the past few days Uh check out the 10 channels there including the draft channel the transaction channel the main thing channel which is where a lot of the action happens and the host updates also stage stage shows and more Link right here in the description You’ll bypass the Apple Upcharge and just pay the $299 a month You can cancel at any time Also check out prize pick Use the code five fiv Put down your five bucks You get $50 to play right away Our contest uh we’re I haven’t clinched it yet Greg I’m not 100% there at prize picks again Uh I’m at I think what am I i lost all my all my plays I got one out of two on all four of my plays the other night But anyway I’m still leading this thing Alex is still losing this thing But check it out You can play along with us Put down code five Play your five You get 50 to play right away And now today’s episode [Music] [Applause] heat nation Yeah Mercy down the Five on the floor Ride for my dogs Here’s a thing You can check the score Hustle hard Couple stars kept the floor plan Got it all Y’all seen the block with one hand and trust the guts We’re here to bring the heat Y’all can hang it up Welcome to Five on the Floor a daily insider show on the Miami Heat and the NBA featuring Ethan Skolnick Greg Sander Alex Toledo Brady Hawk and others from the Five Reason Sports Network Also make sure to subscribe to Off the Floor for the most heat anywhere [Music] All right welcome back to Five on the Floor Here’s today’s floor plan I’m Ethan Skolnick You can follow me at the J Golden Fighters in sports at Greg Savander You can follow me at Greg Savander We’re monitoring everything related to Kevin Durant and more as we lead up to the NBA draft coming up on the 25th of June He will be having a draft party there I don’t know if they’ll be picking anybody We’re doing episodes on that as well I’ve been doing them with Alec with excuse me Adele Brady and I’m sure our guy Matt Hatifan is going to jump in there pretty soon as well But again back to KD and we’re kind of monitoring every part of this and evaluating every part of this Uh the latest news over Saturday morning and I don’t even know if I want to call any of this news It’s just reports It’s stuff that’s out there right now And there seems to be a trend towards Minnesota at the moment away from San Antonio I guess Bill Simmons declared a deal with San Antonio done or being executed like a week ago right wasn’t that coming out of Phoenix as well now all of a sudden they’re not in the mix I don’t really think anybody knows anything honestly I mean we’re all kind of getting bits and pieces of this Uh but we we kind of what we do know is some of the teams that are involved That’s what we know And one of them just sneaking in there Right Right Exactly And but but as far as what what is what exactly is is going to finalize this thing We’ve seen teams come out of nowhere at the last minute Also we’ve also seen terms change and there’s a big game of chicken going on in terms of teams not wanting to put too much out there and you know not want to feel like they’re competing against themselves But the one thing I do want to talk about is Katie as a player because over the past 24 to 48 hours I think in some cases because some Heat fans I think understandably don’t think this will put the Heat over the top if they got him It’s a reasonable argument to be made based on where we just saw the team um 37 and 45 and getting blown out by 92 points in the last two playoff games that they are not a KD away and I I understand that perspective Um I also understand the concerns about you know Katie’s age um some missed time I know Eternal wants to do a podcast on that He’s been pushing that that uh that agenda agenda Uh I like using that word with him uh lately But I also want to sort of try to get back to reality on some things here And and a topic I wanted to get to is is he still a needle mover and and I I’ve heard that term used and and lately um even by those I respect and saying he’s not And I just don’t agree with that And I know I know where it’s coming from because the Suns and the Nets did not have the kind of success that they were supposed to have Even though he had other allstars around him he obviously had allstars around him in Golden State They did have the success everybody expecting them to have And in Oklahoma City he had two allstars at that time one all-star in Westbrook uh for most of his tenure there And they didn’t win but they got close They got to the finals But Greg I just want to I want to give some numbers here and put this into context about the type of player we’re still talking about Even if the metrics suggest he doesn’t get to the rim as much anymore defensively last year a lot of numbers dropped although we brought in people from Phoenix who said that had more to do with Benhoer and Scheme and everything else and other players around him than it had to do with KD specifically But let let me just get to a couple of numbers here Okay I posted this one up on our Discord and also uh again off the floor and also on Twitter In terms of players aged 36 or older most points per game Kevin Durant in what was considered to be a down season by many just had the third best points per game of a player 36 years or older in NBA history The only two seasons above him are two LeBron James seasons Okay uh 2122 and 2223 KD is third If you go deeper into it he’s not quite as high in some metrics like win shares etc because he missed some time but he’s still one of the best seasons for a player 35 or older in history He has not really shown any signs of slowing down in terms of his scoring efficiency He’s plus efficiency from literally every single spot on the floor And the other thing Greg and I’ll let you jump in here on the on on as far as his impact on winning I think some of this is a little bit unfair to him because I think it had more to do with other circumstances First thing Kevin Durant over the course of his career 69 698 and 425 Okay that includes being 37 and 117 on awful Seattle and Oklahoma City teams in the first two years of his career Since then his winning percentage is shacklike Okay And if you haven’t seen Sha Shacks has one of the best winning percentages of all time And even if with the Nets and and the and the Suns um I I think some of this is unfair because you look at the Suns for instance yes they were they were bad this past year They were plus 500 when he played They were 33 and 29 and the year before they had a five% winning percentage They were 44 and 31 Even in Brooklyn the two years in Brooklyn when he played they had winning percentages of 66% and 65 actually 66% both years when he played which meant they won two out of every three games The problem was he Harden and Kyrie I think they were 16 and three when the three of them actually played together They never got to play together So I I guess I’ll just set you up with this I mean is he still a difference maker i think it’s ridiculous to say no I think to what degree is what we’re kind of I think going to unpack here And with KD I don’t think it’s as much that he has suffered individual issues Like obviously his individual success has been great Um and his team success in the regular season has been solid I mean not fantastic but I think what’s jumping out at people is that he has teamed up with multiple allstars in different situations and they haven’t had any playoff success and they haven’t even had really some deep playoff runs aside from when KD got to the series against Milwaukee and uh had his foot on the line Uh so that and Brooklyn didn’t beat them Part of that is like I think people were expecting Katie as he joined forces with these big threes and things like that in Phoenix and Brooklyn that they were going to get further than they ever did And also there’s an element of people that will not let go of the fact that KD went and joined Golden State And like that still haunts him to this day in how people perceive how he impacts winning because it could just be argued that it was not as hard to go and do it in Golden State that it would have than it would have been to do it elsewhere right but as a player um I mean and we think about the Shaq trade because that was like a an older Shaq obviously younger at the time than KD is now but KD is putting up you know relative to his prime years I think pretty uh comparable statistics to like where Shaq was at 32 33 years old when he ended up in Miami I know that there was again and this is where I hearken back to the playoff success deeper runs with Shaq and stuff like that So it’s not apples to apples but I do think that there is degrees of this that um I think people are overstating KD’s lack of success with these teams because he’s gone to Brooklyn and Phoenix And Brooklyn and Phoenix do not have a track record of being great organizations for a number of reasons Uh and then the other part of this is that um I think that there’s been like a a loud contingent of Heat fans that don’t want the Heat to empty their asset treasure chest whatever is in there for KD So people start looking for reasons as to why maybe this shouldn’t happen But for me I think Durant is a needle mover and particularly when you bet on Eric Spolstra bet on your organization and also I I think it would be um a little uh ridiculous to just count on the KD move and then look at the roster and say “Okay let’s evaluate how good of a Miami Heat team that is.” There obviously would have to be more stuff that took place in a team building ma manner to really round out a roster So I guess if you trust the Heat to do those types of things which I tend to do I don’t understand why you’d be adverse to the idea of KD coming Obviously he’s much older than Shaq was but his numbers I mean he’s still getting what 27 a game Like still efficient I I just don’t see the um the drop off that it sounds like um you know and this is obviously some social media chatter and stuff like that The drop off where um where people should be kind of punting on the idea of him as a needle mover Well here’s the difference with him and Shaq I’m I’m not going to make an argument that KD um is as dominant at this stage as even Shaq was at that one But I think we’re also forgetting that at the time there were a lot of questions about Shaq’s conditioning his commitment These things played out uh throughout his Laker tenure but particularly with sort of the the issues between him and Kobe towards the end He wanted a contract extension that the Lakers were not uh inclined to give him at the time I mean I’m looking at his last year in LA Okay He played 67 games so he missed 15 They did get to the finals but remember they they got waxed in the finals Um that was that was that kind of like old man All-Star team that they put was it GP and Carlo joined that team right and and Detroit beat them in the finals Uh I’m not saying it was all Shaq’s fault but there he definitely was not Look I covered I I was at every one of his finals games for the the three championships they won in a row uh against uh I covered those three finals against uh I’m sorry the Sixers the what are we Sixers the Pacers and the Nets right And he was absolutely dumb I mean the series against the Pacers like and he was what 30 29 at that time Like you weren’t doing anything with him like he was cartoonish numbers Okay Um they they weren’t doing and that was a very good Pacer team actually underrated Pacer team in retrospect And I’m looking at but I’m looking at the numbers here the year before he came to Miami So he shot 59% from the floor He led the league in that Um and he still was averaging 10 free throw attempts per game But actually the year before he came to Miami his scoring average had dropped playing the same number of games from 2223 right his scoring average had dropped from 275 down to 215 So he had a six-point drop That was actually the lowest scoring average of his NBA career Shaq by the way never had a losing season Okay Uh because he came in Orlando when they were slightly over 500 But he see he had dropped Now in Miami it picked back up to 229 He shot 60% from the floor His rebounding went up Uh well not his overall rebounding but um his free throw attempts went up His rebounding went down a little bit He he had a season in Miami that was slightly better than his last one with the Lakers He got and and I thought he should have been MVP that year Nash got the MVP A hard argument to make against him but it could have really gone either way But they they rolled the dice on him I’m not saying that Shaq isn’t an all-time great Wasn’t still dominant but he was not the Shaq that we’d seen from like two years earlier So I actually don’t think Durant has and I know he’s 5 years older than when they got Shaq Okay He’s turning 37 in what September But I I don’t think to your point I don’t think Durant has even dropped off as much as Shaq had from his peak from his peak Okay Uh or at the very least it’s equivalent And then you’re also dealing with the fact that we’re now what how many years later i mean we’re two decades later and players can play longer now Uh because just medicine is better The uh you know rehab is better All of this stuff is better And I we’ve never heard the kind of things about KD not loving the game or not putting his all into it that we heard about Shaq his entire career I mean the joke on Shaq was always this guy could have been the greatest player of all time if he gave a Now I’m not saying he never did but we know there were lapses in his conditioning There were questions about all the stuff he did off the floor And even in Miami that came to a head which is why he was traded okay in the two 2007 2008 season So I mean on the other side is I want to let you jump in on this I just I don’t even know that the Heat are going to get Durant whereas we’re talking right now Now again I’m getting texts from media friends of mine that are saying Minnesota’s in the lead I mean this ch two days ago the Spurs were in the lead We’ll see how it actually plays out But I’m just I don’t want this to be sour grapes at the end where Kitty wasn’t that good anyway No no he’s still he’s still great Okay And we’ll talk about that more on the other side because I want to get your thoughts on the Shack thing uh when it happened at the time because I had views on that too that proved to be wrong Um anyway what one thing that is not wrong is using cash app Everybody in our network has it at least the four hosts of five on the floor It’s the easiest 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exclusive referral code on the floor in your profile Send $5 to a friend within 14 days You get $10 dropped right into your account Terms apply That’s money That’s Cash App Here’s where I want to pivot this with you The other issue that’s being brought up is not just what KD is but where the Heat are Okay so I want to take you back to 2004 when they made the trade They’re coming off a 42 and 40 season They were uh 0 and seven that year They beat uh New Orleans in the first round They got to the second round They took Indiana to six games And so they had a better roster than the Heat have now right we agree with it in terms of what they had when that season ended You had Lamar you had Eddie Well you you had a better roster by virtue of the fact that you had Dwayne Wade Everything else is just like we can eval It’s um splitting hairs Dwayne Wade obviously is um heads and shoulders above anything Miami has on the roster today and at Wade’s age and ascending the way that he looked in those playoffs when he dunked on Germaine O’Neal and really made his introduction to the league Yes I mean obviously that is a piece it’s an element that Miami does not have at this current moment for sure Okay but to that point first thing I’m never going to argue against Dwayne You know that and I was there for that entire run But he also was a rookie He was coming off a rookie season We all expected growth after that He had some choppy moments in that rookie season There was about a month stretch where he couldn’t stop turning the ball over again He was playing out of position He was playing at the point They only won 42 games He was pulled off the floor I still don’t agree with Stan about this one in the last in game six Okay Because they needed a three at the end So Stan put Rafer back out there In retrospect we say “Well yeah they had Dwayne.” Okay But Dwayne blew up when Shaq came like it may have happened anyway but it happened quicker because Shaq came here and you know then that sec that second season we’re like okay wait a second like it’s I mean we knew he had potential but now you you’re dealing with like superstar type player here second year and that was even before obviously not just he got got hurt in the ’05 playoffs as we talked about but then in ‘ 06 winning winning the uh winning the finals MVP but at the time again you had a rookie coming off a 16point scoring season who did a a lot of really good things in the playoffs and you basically traded a lot of what helped him to get Shaq Lamar was their best player for most of 034 right oh yeah Okay Not in the playoffs but not at all but regular season he was like kind of the stable engine to some degree Right And I remember him having a terrific game on a Sunday on a national TV game a triple double game like Right Sacramento Thank you Exactly Okay And Eddie was and I know there’s always going to be criticism of Eddie for a variety of reasons but Eddie was still pretty damn good player at the time 0304 helped that group a lot Karan was hurt a lot of that year but had a couple big moments in the playoffs Brian Grant was a stabilizing force even though you could tell he was kind of on the down side at that point because they’d kind of worn him out or wearing him out But again to the point on this when we look back at things like it’s always 2020 right and we’re always like “Oh well they had Dwayne.” But again at that time we didn’t exactly know Now I’m not saying that if you keep Bam and Tyler that either of them is certainly going to pop into a Dwayne Wade like figure No they’re not Okay But you you could say okay that what was left here after the Shaq trade compared to what would be left here if you can make the right KD trade is not all that dissimilar Yes you had Dwayne but again we didn’t know for sure that Dwayne was going to be this You had UD coming off a rookie season You had Eddie and you didn’t really have anything else right like what did they have they had nothing Um may you rest in peace Was Malik Allen on that malik was on that team right he was he played the first year Christian Leightner Um you know they they kind of cobbled together a group Um and it was more about the fact that they got Shaq Um yeah And and and obviously this Dwayne and and it’s so important I think to remember at that moment We didn’t know Dwayne was about to go crazy in the ‘ 06 run and like do all that And it was unprecedented Nobody in year three did that kind of stuff I mean we were I honestly back then when I saw that was like I mean Jordan didn’t even do this in year three Um obviously now we see that um they both had Hall of it’s all Hall of Fame stuff for all those guys but this is I guess where I come down on this and I’m sneaking in this moment to kind of unpack it Yeah we can poke holes in the Heats roster right now and we can poke holes in what Kevin Durant is or is not right now but there’s also a part of this that’s like if you got to get one of those guys right one of and if Kevin Durant is not one of those guys then you you kind of have to evaluate all right can you go get one of those guys via trade and do you have enough to go get one the answer is no to that question They can’t bid with the top teams in the league So that should be a qualifying kind of um consideration when when they’re figuring out that they can’t even bid for the top players out there if you want to get one through the draft you’re gonna have to be bad which I don’t think anybody’s planning on doing that And so it’s like you kind of have to figure out how you’re gonna take your shot right and so I just think that the Durant move for Miami specifically it makes a lot more sense than for other teams because I don’t see the Heat having another viable path other than trying to build through the draft And it’s like we wait for this perfect scenario where the stars align and the the allar in his prime is available Well if that’s really what we’re going to wait for until we trade whatever assets we have like why not I guess accumulate more assets so that you’re really ready for that moment I think that those are kind of all the questions that swirl when we turn our nose up to what Kevin Durant is today and what he could mean for the Heat in an Eastern conference that is wide open And even Indiana who looks great I don’t think it’s guaranteed that when the when teams start or when the media starts putting out uh predictions for the way the regular season will go next year I don’t think it’ll be Indie is the top seed in the conference across the board I think that people will kind of look at it like it could be three or four different teams and who’s to say Miami can’t get in that mix And so I just think to turn your nose up at KD at this point um like what so what is the other path that’s so much better well that okay on your Indiana point um they have decisions to make coming forward on on Nemhart on Miles Turner Apparently they’re willing to pay the tax for the first time in 20 years but let’s see cuz teams are going to come after Miles Turner and we’ll see how that plays out And so they may not even return intact I mean that they could trade math and they could but there’s going to be media people are probably going to make them like a begrudging fourth seed in the East because I still don’t think there’s great respect for them But you’re right there’s no team you know that you’re like okay you can’t get past that team if you make the right moves I think a lot of organizations are thinking that way But to your point on KD and we’re seeing Giannis you know doesn’t seem inclined to ever leave Milwaukee because if he’s not going to leave now or force him when I mean that I don’t know how they can build a contender around him next year I I guess the plan is keep their core What is their core i don’t even know what it is I mean seriously Kyle Luzma like I like what is their core like I don’t even know what that is Brook’s not even going to be there Milton’s not there anymore Drew was traded for Dame and Dame they’re saying “Well they’re gonna wait for him to come back from Achilles.” I mean come on Okay so if he’s not leaving now when is he leaving and Luca I I think that would have been a possibility as you look at what was happening in Dallas but I I don’t I don’t see it I now because I mean the Lakers they’re going to make him such an international star even beyond what he is I think he’d be crazy to leave there honestly Um so what are we what are we talking about like who who who over the next year who over the next year is are they going to have a shot at that is a better player than Kevin Durant is right now Exactly I I you’re more I It took me three minutes of stumbling around and you got to the point right there and that’s just where I think um the the league has changed like there the big three era and where you can have such a topheavy roster those teams aren’t making it and even the biggest spenders aren’t necessarily making it So I’m not even saying it from that perspective I think it’s just showing when you have is it seven years now that we’ve had a different champion like that is unprecedented as well It just everything flies in the face of the idea that the heat are so far out of it that you couldn’t create a path with Durant Bam Hero and whatever else would be around it It may be an expensive experiment to some degree but I I I just think that like to completely write that off is to ignore what is happening around the league and just how parody has struck um to the point that like the Pacers are making the finals all of a sudden and they’re not a shoe in to be any team that uh like you know like you said they could probably be a begrudging three or four seed Boston’s going to be out of the mix kind of in some ways next year I I just I don’t see what other player to your point and what other moment is going to present itself that where it looks like Miami would be able to to make a run and and and to that point and now I’m going to shut up after this If we’re gonna wait for that perfect player and that perfect moment and the stars to align then there’s a part of this that like it really and I’m the anti-tank king but there’s a part of it that’s like well what are we doing here finishing as a playin team like why go through those motions if we’re re really going to wait for the perfect scenario to present itself yeah And they won’t tank We both know that So it’s it’s that that that’s why when when when fans are like you know I’m saying well the fans don’t have the patience for tanking And then the fans are throwing it back at me on off the floor and saying “No you guys don’t have the patience for tanking because you know you guys want the downloads and you want the interest.” And I Yeah Guilty is charged Okay In that regard but the the the they won’t ever go full tank Exactly So it’s we’re not we’re not talking about like going through the process that OKC has gone through successfully or dozens of organizations over time have gone through unsuccessfully Okay they’re they’re not going to do it They’re just not going to do it So if you’re not going to commit to it 100% I it I I I don’t see the point of it Then I then I am kind of with their philosophy of all right let’s you know let’s let’s figure out a way to stay kind of close enough that if we make the right move we can get ourselves right back up there and that’s why as someone who was kind of like on KD I don’t want to give up too much I’m looking at it I’m saying I think they’re closer to at least making this thing interesting by getting KD than they are to getting a player as good as KD in the next year Exactly I I think I think that’s where they’re at Okay And that’s why and by the time we finish this podcast he’s probably going to be uh they’re going to announce that on July 1st as soon as the Timberwolves can aggregate contracts uh they’ve agreed to a deal in principle that he’s going to be a Timberwolf May may very well happen and all this is pointless But I think it’s it’s been a good exercise regardless because I think it sort of gives us a sense of where they’re at And I I just keep looking through these rosters and I’m like I just don’t know who’s gonna Yes players are going to be available Okay But players with a Hall of Fame pedigree who are still playing at a very high level even if they don’t do certain things as well as they used to do I think are going to be really hard to find And and today’s 37 is not yesterday’s 37 I I just especially for a player like him And I know he’s had the Achilles I know he’s missed other time And I know Eternal is going to come at me with all the games he’s missed and all that the difference between him and Jimmy All right Jimmy missed games when he could have played them I I don’t get the sense that’s what’s happened with KD It’s either been like an Achilles rupture or something along those lines that he’s coming back from or it’s been teams shutting him down because there was really no point That’s really where it’s been for the past few years And if you look at when he when he’s played we can talk him down as much as you want And if he lines up with Minnesota next year the Heat are still gonna be afraid of him dropping 35 on them You think Bam wants him here yes All right So I think you add all these factors together and that’s why I’ve kind of come around to this Um you know again if you cannot give up too much which is was always the balance here All right Thanks Greg We’ll do more of these as they come up Um I am I’m going to be busy a good deal this weekend which means there is going to be a trade because that’s usually how this thing happens But we figured we’d sneak one in Have a good one everybody Thank you for listening to the five on the floor on the five reason sports network After all someone needs to listen to my dad

As the Miami Heat continue to be among the teams in discussions with the Phoenix Suns about Kevin Durant, Ethan Skolnick and Greg Sylvander touch on some recent narratives about Durant’s current ability, the comparisons to the 2004 acquisition of Shaquille O’Neal…. and also about whether the Heat can find anyone as impactful as Durant in the next year.

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