State of the Heat (episode 3): Greg Sylvander’s word | Five on the Floor

State of the Heat (episode 3): Greg Sylvander’s word | Five on the Floor

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For those of you who are not huge baseball fans, just follow me and the rest of our group. We seem to be doing better on baseball than we did on basketball. So go to prizepix.com use the code f i ve. And now today’s episode where luxurious heat nation. Yeah. Mercy down the gang. Y on the floor ride for my dogs here. You can check the score. Hustle harden stop one hand and pap have 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. Morning Back to Five on the floor. Here’s today’s floor plan. It’s Greg Savander’s turn. You can follow him at Greg Savander. We’ve been doing some episodes on past. There will be more of those. Our guy Matte Mayorg has been talking to everybody who ever witnessed a game in the 2005 2006 championship run. Be posting some of those here on the podcast feed. He’s already spoken to Ira, Tim Reynolds, Mike Wallace, Eric Reed, uh just a litany of people. I’ve got George Sedano on here. We’re going to have Israel Gutierrez uh and others and adding players as well. So trying to commemorate what’s the 20th anniversary season of the 2006 championship, but we’re also looking ahead to this season and we’re doing a bunch of episodes present and future. And the simple question is what is the state of the Miami Heat? So Greg, you are third here in order. Alex Leo went first. His word for the state of the Miami Heat was was satisfactory. Satisfactory. Brady’s word was seeking. I will let you comment on those two words after the break. That is the new segment where we try to turn everybody against each other. What is your word? Crossroads. Okay, that’s fair. And I’m just going to uh tee up the definition that I just Googled and I’m going to go to the second bullet point because I feel that it is most relevant. It’s a point at which a critical decision must be made that will have far-reaching consequences. That’s what I mean by crossroads. Do you want me to further expand or you got anything? Further, this is the floor is yours on this one. Like I will challenge you as we go forward, but I want you to put this out there. I’m not giving my word until the end. I’m going to let everybody else have their say and then I’m going to pick the best of the words in my view and then I’ll expand on that one. But so go ahead. So, Crossroads is where I’m at. And these are the reasons why. Uh, I think that for one, I’m a I have a flare for the dramatic. So, I wasn’t going to come here with a boring word. I wanted to dive into this topic a little deeper, but not like satisfactory for instance. Satisfactory. Yeah. I was surprised that Alex went I don’t want to give any my opinions on on that so that we don’t disrupt the uh the flow of the show. Trying to keep the format down. Uh, so this is why I think that they’re at a crossroads, Ethan. It’s it’s a number of reasons. One, they had a superstar. Uh, they had one of the guys, those guys that can take over. And obviously, he was starting to age and things were getting weird. And Jimmy Butler, y’all know who I’m talking about. He left. And now they are seeking, I’ll sneak that word in here, uh, probably another franchise player of that ilk, right? Um, obviously y’all know I love Bam. Y’all know that I actually really do like Tyler as well. Um, but I’m a Bam Autobio fan first and foremost, and I believe that he can be part of a championship team. But when I say 1A, like I’m talking about the guys that can rise to the level of the very best players on planet Earth, and Jimmy did that in the playoffs, and they don’t have that guy right now. I guess most people may roll their eyes at me saying crossroads because their cap um situation right now is is such that they didn’t necessarily get to go hunting in free agency this off seasonason. They made a trade that was opportunistic and it was a a good move. But this is why I say crossroads. When we did the Norm Pal episode, something really dawned on me and it resonated and it sat with me for a couple days now. They’re going to in two off seasons, Ethan, have the ability, if they really want to, they can have just BAM on the books. Now, I know that that’s unrealistic for roster building purposes. No one needs to explain that to me, but they could basically reset this whole thing. And why I think we’re at a crossroads is I believe the Miami Heat have really really big decisions coming up on Tyler Herro, on Nicole Yoic, on Norm Pal, on um the all of their young players and how valuable are they to either winning formulas of basketball or as assets. And I just think when you’re at a moment where we know that this isn’t necessarily a top contending team in the league, maybe they’ll surprise. I still think you’re on to something with Spo’s coach of the year. The the the the Heat in these seasons usually overachieve. That’s a conversation for another day. That said, they’re not a contender. They need to really make um there there’s move there’s moves to be made. They’re probably what, two moves away, two really big swings away from us getting back in that conversation. So, to that point, and I’ll I’ll continue on later, but I do want you to get um you know, a word in edgewise here. Uh, I really think they’re at a crossroads. And they didn’t think they were at a crossroads with Jimmy Butler till it was too late. And there’s also a timing element to all of this that makes it time sensitive. So that’s why I’m going with that word. You I go back in history when you use a word like that because I think there have been other seasons that they’ve been there. And you know, I look at let’s let’s cycle back a little bit. Okay, let’s go all the way to the late 90s. Some of the crew is still there. Obviously Pat is the central figure in that uh but others as well. Obviously the arrisons had taken over the team and I I felt they were at a crossroads situation a couple of times during those late 90s but they didn’t really they they kind of kept the group together. They just kept rolling it back rolling it back and then finally they realized I think they were at a crossroads uh as they left the floor in 2000 and made that dramatic trade that we talked about 25th anniversary recently. uh the trade, you know, to get Eddie Jones, Brian Grant, move off of Mashford and PJ Brown, etc. Crossroads move that I think would have paid off for them, could have paid off for them, but of course, Gazo got sick. Then they have the Zo Valley, uh, you know, that then they Dwayne, right? I don’t think they were really at a crossroads anytime during the early part of the Shaq tenure because they just they got Shaq and then they won a championship in the second season. you know, they made the big decisions to upgrade the roster, which we’ve talked about on the other series we’re doing here in the offseason of 2005. I think they were at a bit of a crossroads. I would say in 2007, you had run it back. Basically, the 2006 championship team, the team essentially just didn’t really care anymore. Ran out of gas, ran out of ran ran out of FS to give essentially in that season. And then 2007, uh, they were sort of at a crossroads, but they tried sort of one more time, right, with Shaq and then early in the season, clear wasn’t going to work and shut everybody down, won 15 games. Um, and then they were in a build, right? They were in a build back with Dwayne. Dwayne coming back better, I think, than anybody expected. People don’t remember that. Like he coming off the injuries like the Dwayne that we got in 2008 through 2010. I don’t think most people are anticipating he would get to that level cuz that was his best level other than the 2006 finals. Um and then you just had the big three. So I and then the 2014 they didn’t really have a a crossroads choice. They were not intending to be at a crossroads. LeBron left. Um and then they had a quick decision to make and the decision to make was okay. They didn’t think Henry Thomas was going to take Bosch to Houston. They thought he had they had a deal with him. He went to go get Bosch more money which ended up getting Dwayne less money which nobody talks about now even though Dwayne was also his client. And I guess the only crossroads was a quick decision like are we going to just are we going to try to pull back here or are we going to try to build around Chris and Dwayne, right? And then of course Chris got sick and so that put them in another situation which put them in a hole where for a few years there like there really wasn’t a whole lot going on until three years basically until until Jimmy came in. Okay. So I don’t know Greg actually as I go through it that they’ve been in that many of these type of situations where it feels like you could pivot either way. Right. Exactly like that. That’s you I’m glad you went there. It is a moment where they have a lot of options. And I know that no one wants to hear about flexibility, but they just do just by virtue of the way that their salaries line up going forward. And every time a star has left Miami, whether it was Shaq, whether it was LeBron, whether it was Jimmy, inevitably, whether it was the season right then or in the near future, they had to make some decisions and they were at a level of crossroads. And so to me for like how I absorb this team is this is the beginning of a new build cycle for them because Jimmy is gone and I guess you could say it got started when you got pieces back for Jimmy in the trade. DaVon Mitchell was a great grab. Like I’m with it and now Norm Pal being there. Wiggins could still prove to be something. So we’ll see how it all pans out. But the Heat made a decision um after the 30 and 11 run to invest in the guys that they had and that decision proved to be a rough one. And then to your point cuz where you were about to go is then Jimmy came and it changed everything then and a new build cycle started and they made the moves that they made and everyone can have their opinions about that. But I think most Heat fans that were around for that and are Heat fans now and are looking at the team now, there is questions to be asked of like what happens if they do invest in this team and what does that mean and what does that look like going forward? What kind of ceiling does that team have? So those are just a lot of question marks to me that um I know everyone wants the basketball to come back. So do I. I want to talk about the games, but this is a rare moment where I don’t think that we can look at this team and in good conscience tell the fans that this is a group that the that the team curated exactly as they are because it’s exactly as they envisioned it. This kind of happened to them when Jimmy blew everything up. And so they’re making the best of it and they’re building on the run. Sometimes you got to build the plane as it’s taking off. So that’s what they’re kind of trying to do. Uh but these big decisions like if they invest in all these guys and then they’re just a 37 win team over and over again, that’s a problem. Well, a couple things on this. Um you mentioned that this happened to them. So they do have some experience of this with some of the situations that I just talked about. Zo happened to them. They were not anticipating that Zo was going to get kidney disease and that changed the direction. That was a build that was in progress and then they they they made it a better team after it was already a good team. They kept losing to the Knicks, but that was a good team uh that had played together for a while. Obviously, it was a playoff team and they thought that this would take them to the next level. I thought it would take them to the next level and then Zo got sick. So then that happened to them, right? So then they had to pivot and then all of a sudden they got the fifth pick in the draft in 2003 and that was the ultimate pivot, right? Okay. And then it leads to Shaq uh Shaq quitting on them happened to them getting old, quitting on them. Then they had to make a decision. And then again, they go and then their decision then was, “Okay, we’re going to we’re not going to really give Dwayne the tools he needs here. Be patient. Be patient until you can’t be patient anymore.” And by the way, I just saw this clip the other day and I can’t believe I missed it, but we’re going to do an episode about this because I’m glad that Dwayne addressed this, but apparently this was a while ago on the OG show where he said that information that I’ve had for a while, but I don’t think fans really know this that Dwayne had to be Dwayne Dwayne had to be talked into staying with the big three. Everybody makes it seem like Dwayne recruited LeBron, and that is not true. Yes, Dwayne’s presence was a reason LeBron wanted to come, but LeBron was coming, as was Chris. Dwayne was the one who was on the edge, who they couldn’t reach. Okay? And I don’t think most people know that, but Dwayne has acknowledged it recently, so I guess I can reveal that, but I’ve I’ve known that for a bit. So, but anyway, getting back to it. So, Dwayne, we’ll do a whole episode on that at some point because I I don’t again, this is there’s this mythology about certain things here, and I nobody loves Dwayne more than me, but there are some things here that I’m glad here for that episode, right? I’m glad he’s telling the truth about that because they’ve kind of let him have his version of it, but it’s not really the right version. You can’t be going to Chicago and also building the team for Pat Riley as some fans like to suggest. Dwayne had everything to do with all of that. You can’t be looking at Chicago and also Dwayne’s presence, Dwayne’s presence, provided there was a presence, yes, but Dwayne actively recruiting LeBron is not something that ever happened. I just And I I don’t is We should do an episode about the 10 greatest. Write that one down. 10 greatest myths about the Miami Heat because there’s a lot of them and that’s one of them. Okay. And again, I love Dwayne, but it is what it is. All right. But anyway, getting back to this. Those things happened to them. Okay. Um, you know, and then Bosch getting sick. That happened to them. They were buil people forget they had already pivoted away from Dwayne. They were paying Bosch more. They were playing through Chris and then Chris got the blood clots not once but twice. and got for for Bosch. Sorry, they got Goran for Bosch. Okay, so that’s another one. And then like you said, then this Jimmy thing kind of happened to them. Okay. Although some will say they should have anticipated the Jimmy thing because he’s Jimmy. But yes. All right. But the other thing you said, and then on the other side of the break, I’m going to let you go at the other two guys here on our podcast. The other thing you said is this is the start of a build. And I think this is where this one is a little different. It’s not the start of the build because you’ve already paid Bam an extension and you’re considering doing the same with Tyler. So, this is not a breakdown to the beginning of a build. Like the Jimmy build the Jimmy build felt like, okay, this is a this is a clean break. You’ve traded because not only did they get Jimmy, they dumped Whiteside in the deal who had been part of the last the 2016 when they extended Hassan at the max. All right. like that. He was supposed to be a core centerpiece of the build. That’s what pissed Dwayne off so much among other things. So, right. So, I know you might and I just saw Hassan recently. So, well, you know, I saw him. He’s a bodybuilder now, but he’s playing basketball in the Miami Pro League. You can go see him there anytime. Uh he’s on Rey’s team. But look, they were looking to build around Hassan and obviously that wasn’t an injury situation. That was just a not caring anymore and not really being good enough to build around situation, right? So, that’s what that was. But if you look at this th this time around, okay, th this build is in progress. Even though Jimmy’s not here, the Jimmy build in 2019 felt clean and fresh. Yes, Bam was here, but he wasn’t a full-time starter before Jimmy came. He became an allar the first year Jimmy was here. Tyler was new. So, that was a new group. Like Duncan was the guy that hung around. Other than that, like they transitioned. I mean, waiters was on the team still. He didn’t even make it and Justice. But here’s the other thing. They dumped Hassand Jimmy. They dumped Justice. Uh they dumped Justice uh I’m sorry, J James Johnson and waiters in the same trade in the mid-season to get Iguodal and Crowder. So they cleaned out the previous build. Like they totally torched it to build around Jimmy Bam who was a new starter and it felt very much like when they built in 2003 and into 2004 when you know Hasslam new starter in 2004 wasn’t a starter in 2003 right Dwayne emerging that was and Shaq comes in but it was a new build. Okay this is not a new build yet. I think that’s where fans will will kind of question it because they’ll be like, well, yeah, I mean, you’re building around younger players. You’ve got Wear, you’ve got Hakez, you’ve got Yoic, you’ve got Larson, you’ve got Kisha Johnson, you’ve got you’re going to see what you have with all these guys, but you got Bam on the books at a lot of money and you got Tyler a little decision to make on Tyler. So, when you say crossroads, I think it applies there, too. Yeah. Because they’re they’re not really they’re not really they’re like a season away from a new build. Right. Right. And maybe that new build includes a trade of Tyler Hero or maybe it doesn’t. I don’t think it’s going to include a trade of Bam, but I I feel like they’re a little bit still in between. Now, what they would say, I think, okay, is that they’re further along than a new build. Like they have players in place and Bam and Tyler who they who have, you know, shown a certain level of performance. Both have been allstars as has Andrew Wiggins. Okay. and Norm Powell could have been. So, you’ve got three former all-stars, including one who just was an all-star. Bam certainly could get back to that level with just a better first half of the season. Norm was close to it. So, you’re talking about four guys who have been or have been close to all-star level players at some point of their career and none is far from his prime. And so, I think their argument would be, okay, like we’re not starting, we don’t have to start fresh. We have these guys who’ve been proven players and then we have the others. All right, but I’m going to let you we’re going to stop there because I want to give you some time to go at your co-host. So, we’re going to do that in a second. Now, after this happens, these guys are never going to send Greg any money. But if they ever did, they would use Cash App because first thing they’d use our code. It’s on the or go check it out. Download with on the floor. 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Instant discounts provided by Cash App and Block Inc. brand. Visit cash.appleback/mpodcast for full disclosures. Okay, so this is how we’re going to do this. Now we’re up to number three here. Now, your word is crossroads. I’m going to put that one in my pocket for our next guest, who I think is going to be Adele. Could be Sean, Brian, Eternal, um any of the others uh from our group. But right now, I’m going to allow you to do some elimination as we go forward here. So, Alex’s word was satisfactory. Brady’s word was seeking. You are more in agreement with who? Um, okay. This is where it gets tricky, but I’ll be um I’ll be quick with the way that I break this down. I believe that Alex absorbed your question about the state of the heat and very much took a fine tooth comb to the offseason moves. So when he said satisfactory to me the way that I absorbed that episode was he was talking about what they had done this summer to to help the team now and he said satisfactory. I was surprised cuz to me that word means that you are like you’re happy with with with what’s happening and I felt like right hasn’t he been the most critical of of the four of us of the front office there’s others in the network who have been more critical but I’m saying of of the four of us I believe he’s been the most critical yes for sure so I was surprised he went in that direction and I’m I’m glad that he clarified that it’s not that he’s satisfied and it’s not that um satisfactory he was taking satisfactory is I think to mean like uh C++ something like that or B minus um not an A like it could potentially be construed. Um, I think Brady’s a little more on the nose uh with Seeking because as I talk about them and I didn’t know Brady’s word before we got to the show, by the way, just so everyone knows, I’ve I you’ve heard Alex’s episode actually as we’re recording this as we’re recording this, Brady’s episode isn’t up yet because we’re kind of stacking these. But let me let me just give you context. his his idea there was that they’re they’re seeking again another player to add to this, but additionally they’re they’re also they’re also seeking clarity with their and which is kind of what you’re talking about to a certain degree with some of the young players. Uh I think that’s kind of where we pivoted the episode. Yeah. And so I I’m with him there. And I think that they’re seeking also to like basically reinforce their identity um as a new group and kind of pick up the bad vibes and make sure that they are completely snuffed out of that locker room. So there’s a lot of stuff that the team is seeking. So I’m with him there. Um I uh think that it links to the the crossroads that we’ve alluded to in this episode. So, uh, as much as, um, Alex did handle that very tough question with a lot of great points related to their off seasonason, because his other two words, pragmatic and opportunistic, I thought both of those could have played parts as well, um, to how they handled this particular offseason. And I thought that them uh seeing who fell to them in the draft was great and the norm pile trades a no-brainer, but this team has far bigger issues than just the transactions that took place in the last four uh months or so. So to me, that’s why I’m looking ahead to what they’re seeking. And what they’re seeking is beyond crossroads, as I said. Right. That’s fair. And like I said, we’ll continue to pit you guys against each other as we go forward. I I will say this though, you haven’t heard Brady, but Brady said that I was making this a Kendrick versus Drake thing, and I asked him who he is, and he said Drake. Whoa. So, yeah, it’s unfortunate, but anyway, it is what it is. It’s not who you would have chosen, I think, in that case. All right, we’ll get to Adele on the these episodes going forward. Cash App, use the code on the floor. Prize picks, use the code FIVE if you want to sponsor us. Uh, yeah, we’re still doing episodes this summer, so you can definitely do that. Also, I do want to make a mention of this. I haven’t really talked about this a lot, but I’m going to be start doing some writing again um over where Alex is as well on the Sports Illustrated Heat site. So, you want to check that out. It ain’t going to be the pros that I used to write, but it’s uh it’s something. So, I I’ll get back in the game there a little bit. All right, Greg. Appreciate it. They not like us. Thank you for listening to The Climb on the Floor on the Fiverr Sports Network. After all, someone needs to listen to my dad.

In the third installment of the State of the Heat series, Greg Sylvander comes up with a more lyrical word for the Miami Heat’s current situation — and chooses between Brady and Alex. Ethan Skolnick hosts.

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