Miami Heat Salary Dump Haywood Highsmith To Nets And Get Under Luxury Tax | Heat Nation Is Not Happy

Miami Heat Salary Dump Haywood Highsmith To Nets And Get Under Luxury Tax | Heat Nation Is Not Happy

Hey, welcome on in guys. Tobin here with you and thanks for checking out the channel. Hope you’re doing well there. If you guys could subscribe, that’d be great and appreciate you stopping by. So, we got some Miami Heat news today. Heywood Highmith has been dealt to the Brooklyn Nets. Uh they attached a second round pick to him and basically shipped his salary into the Brooklyn Nets who are well below the cap and as a result, the Miami Heat have gotten themselves below the luxury tax. hang a banner up. Everybody loves that. They love when their team uh we made a sal we made a luxury tax move. Yeah. Stay away from the repeater tax. Nothing f Hey, nothing fires up fans quite like the idea of saving millions for a franchise worth billions. You just see every teams are NBA franchises roll out of bed right now and are worth $4 billion. So, nothing quite gets the fans fired up. Initial us. This sucks because uh just off the bat, Haywood Highmith defended his ass off, turned himself into a productive shooter. Always felt like in like national televised games like this guy was showing up when a lot of guys are squeaky cheek scared. Um, you know, you look at Haywood Highmith and you may not think like those are the most impressive, you know, knock your socks off numbers in the world, but tell me like tell me how many times when everybody else was pooping the bed. How many times you felt like Haywood Highmith was just always stepping up, never scared, you know, would just put up these these big-time games against big opponents, getting to the basket, hitting big-time threes, and yeah, was a really really really good defender. And, you know, so for the Miami Heat to just basically send him off with a bag of donuts to to get under the luxury tax is not a great feeling. I can’t spin that anyway. you know, for the cap gurus out there that want to talk about where the team is at and all that, you know, there’s just something about him in particular getting sent off because he, you know, does embody what the franchise claims to love. Um, that just sending him off to to Basketball Wasteland for a with a pick to get into the cap is uh is a rough one. But it’s not surprising, I guess, because we knew that the Miami Heat wanted to get under this luxury tax. Pat Riley said as much. Um, it’s funny, man. I remember being around uh being at the press conference. I think it was it was at Riley’s press conference. I was talking to somebody who’s around the Heat a lot um with the franchise and and he had mentioned because we were talking about like the KD stuff and whatnot. And he had mentioned, you know, old LT. He’s like, “Probably going to be about probably going to be an offseason about luxury tax.” And I was like, “All right.” I mean, I didn’t I didn’t love hearing that. and you know uh but definitely was came from a place where I was like I I never forgot it and that does seem like uh what we’ve gotten here is how the Heat are are operating under this now. Like look uh has the offseason been a complete waste? No. I mean they did get Norman Powell for nothing. So I I I can’t completely hose it down. There’s just something, I guess, in the the uh the soul of your fandom that just sees a move like this and you’re just like gh I I don’t like this. Um you look at the the roster and you know there was some talk about Simone Fonteio because I guess they could have done something like with this with him, right? But he does make almost twice as much as Haywood. Not twice as much, let’s be better at math, but he makes 8.3 million to Haywood’s 5.6. So, you know, was was Brooklyn asking too much to take on that this year as opposed to Haywood? Like, was that the price? Was there a difference there? Perhaps. I don’t know. Miami also got back a conditional second round pick, but it would I I believe it’s uh it’s only if like it’s not one that’s going to convey. It’s it’s very unlikely to convey. So, they’re probably got nothing back. This is just a pure oldfashioned get under the uh the tax line move and uh is is a tough is a is a tough one to swallow, man. It is uh it really is it really is a a tough a tough look. And so and look, would Haywood have been a huge part of of plans this year? Like I did go into this wondering like, hey, what is his role going to be? because he wasn’t going to start. He was a little bit in that Duncan Robinson realm of like it always felt like his minutes were getting messed with like he’d either play a ton or he’d play none. And so we do know that they like Keshot Johnson a lot. And so you could definitely look at Keshot as as like is he going to be basically on the the five below salary of giving them what Haywood Highmith is? and they feel like that it’s a wash. You know, perhaps, you know, there’s going to be this is this is a team that probably looks on their wings and they’re like, “Yeah, Haime is going to play more. We got to we got to figure that out.” We know that off the bench. Nico is going to play. We mentioned Fonteio. I Here’s the thing where I I I look at this and I’m a little surprised by things, right? If they were planning on trading Haywood all along, making a big deal about the whole switch of numbers publicly, they may have done it, but the Heat the Heat putting Heywood Highmith out, like, why did you make this move? Um, I don’t think the Heat would be like, “Hey, you guys go ahead and post that if they felt like they were going to move Haywood all the which makes me believe, remember there was that rumor that came out about Fonteo feeling like he was going to get uh waved and I was like that doesn’t seem to make a lot of sense because you can’t just wave him. You could wave and stretch I guess. Um and you could have saved a second round pick that way. But it it does make me believe like there was probably a talk at some point like hey what is what is the move? Who is going to be the move? Like it was probably all along the Heat knew we’re going to go in. We want to be under the the tax before the end of the season, before the start of the season, excuse me. But it leads you to believe that, you know, maybe the Haywood thing was a little bit of a last resort because why go about the whole thing of like Norman Powell having a talk with Haywood and switching to Aid and making that public and then making a social media thing out of it. Um, that’s why I kind of just, it feels to me like maybe the Fonteio thing was where they were going to go and then either decided against it because they didn’t want that dead money on the books for three years or that uh or that Brooklyn just wanted too much for that chunk of a salary to be on their books for this year. So, they just decided, okay, you know, the unfortunate pill to swallow here is we got to give up a player we really, really like and, you know, is just a winning player all around. Like, just is about the right stuff. And that’s what Heywood Highmith is. He’s he’s just about the right stuff. He defends his ass off. Um, you know, puts so much work into that shooting throughout his throughout his Heat career. Um, and I just think that every fan likes rooting for that guy. Um, and by by the way, this is a fan base that seems like they got polarizing takes on everybody pretty much on the roster. He’s not one of them. Like, he’s one I just feel like every Heat fan just like, “Yeah, I I love rooting for Haywood Eismith, the locksmith. Who doesn’t want to who doesn’t want to get behind that guy?” So, you know, this is look, it’s a little bit of tweenerland, right? because like you’re looking at this heat off season and we’re trying to figure out like where things are going and while purely on the record do I think losing Haywood Highmith dramatically decreases the Heat’s chances of winning? Honestly, no. Because I again I was looking at this rotation. I was a little confused about like where his minutes were going to go, especially with, you know, we know what the starting lineup’s going to look like with, let’s just assume Tyler, Norman, let’s assume Wiggins, we know Bam and where. Let’s just assume that’s the five. And then off the bench, you know, you’re going to look with Nico likely, DaVon for sure. Um, and then I don’t think they’re going to go into this thing not playing Haywood Highmith, Casperis, Yakonis, Simone, Fonteio, Pella Larson. Like I do think that probably Fonteo and Casper is probably on the low end. He probably would have played above those guys. But I don’t think that they’re they’re rats off a ship on him. I think they definitely wanted to give Keshaw a look. Pella, hard to imagine he’s not gonna get minutes. Um, you know, Impella is sneaky big, you know, like if you if you just kind of break it down, like they’re both 6’5. I would say Haywood’s probably got like more wingspan if I had to guess. But but Pella has shown himself to be a pretty stout defender. Um, and good luck, dude, because they’re probably going to throw you at all the assignments that they had for Haywood Heismith if somebody was torturing him. So, I would say between the Arizona Wildcat twins with Keshot and Pella, like those are going to be the guys they’re going to look to and be like, “Hey, this is this is your spot now.” And they’re obviously both on real cheap skis deals. Um, but yeah, it’s impossible not to feel after something like this like this didn’t make your team better. You basically just did this. you you did lop off a ro a potential rotation player. A guy who’s been a rotation player, a guy who’s started plenty of games for the Miami Heat, a guy who can call you could basically call is like the ultimate Swiss Army knife being called into action to do stuff. Um, and you just dumped them. So, it doesn’t make your roster better. You know, I can’t spin that. That would be that would that would that would not be the truth. Um, is it the most detrimental loss to the roster? All right, I’m not going to get crazy about it, but it’s it’s, you know, if if we’re just talking tags, like it wasn’t like immediately necessary. I just want my my big question out of this is like was this their a plan like this because we just know that they had the news he is getting knee surgery. We know that too that he is uh that he he suffered an injury. So maybe that’s another thing that could have thrown a wrinkle to this. Maybe Haywood Highmith’s knee surgery is a little worse than we know. And if that did have him out of the mix and he wasn’t going to play out of the box in, you know, now supposedly it was going to be like around the time that the that preseason was over was about the time, but you know, maybe they thought it was, you know, a gnarly one. Maybe they thought that it was a lot worse than we thought it was. That’s that’s possible and potential, too, that they had their reasons, but it didn’t I don’t know. I have a hard time believing the the way they like Haywood, the way that they were doing a bunch of social media stuff with him. I mean, like one of the go-to community guys that they did all the time with. I got a hard time believing this was their plan A when it came to getting under the tax. It feels like maybe the injury or maybe what was getting asked for to take Fonte off the hands. Um, I feel like that was probably planned. Now, you know, they may put it into a spo a scope of like, hey, they think, you know, Font, if if that’s the case now, Fontekio is the healthy guy, like they’re going to try and beef him up and maybe flip him at some point this season, maybe. I don’t know. Um, but I I would probably lean on like Keshot being the the go-to on this one. And and we’ll see, you know, maybe there’s more reaction as well. I will say this, and this was uh this was a rough one, but Draymond Green is mocking the trade on social media. And uh that that that didn’t feel great, but uh Draymond tweeted out, “Look what you’ve done, Jimbo.” And basically just saying, “You got a team out here salary dumping salary dumping guys now because you left them.” So, that doesn’t obviously feel great that you have uh you have Draymond Green here helping Jimmy piss on the grave of the Miami Heat as it stands right now. Um I don’t like that very much. Yeah, that that that that one that one doesn’t feel fantastic. So, but it’s kind of crazy, man. It is. You know, you can only wonder like what the hell situation is when he would have been back cuz you figure like when he did get back, would the Heat feel like he was going to play enough to add value, trade value to him? I I don’t know. I’m spitballing here on on the broader scope of it. I don’t love it. I don’t like the way that this I don’t know like I I don’t think you can love what it signals. Um and I’m not saying that this offseason has been a complete botch because it hasn’t. The Norman Pal move was was immense for them. Um the Heat they tweet out afterwards, “Thanks for everything.” H yeah, thanks for everything. We’re sending you sending you to a team with a pick to get the hell out of here. Seen some of the reactions to it on social media. You will ru this day. Can we plead trade Roier? Why couldn’t we package him along? Yeah, because he makes 26 million. Who the hell’s What are you going to have to give up two first round picks to take that salary? I don’t get it. SMH. Guy just goes, “Bitch, are you kidding me?” That’s a fair reaction. Uh Hugo, he tagged me on this. He said, “Traded our best defender and Roier still on the roster. What a joke.” Thank you, Big Hay. All the best. I get the Roier thing. Uh, look, trading 26 million expiring is a lot harder to a team than trading five. But I understand I get it. I understand why you guys are are putting that out there. Oh man, guy just has a clown emoji. And look, you know, the Miami Heat have, I know, bucked against the trend of, you know, people thinking that they’re cheaping out or they’re not spending all the money. I I don’t think that’s the case. I think that they’ve mostly shown that, but you know, we know that you just had this whole thing blow up in your face because you were scared to pay Jimmy. Uh we’ll see what happens with the Tyler Hero thing and now you have this. Now, I know there’s mechanisms to this because you don’t want to be on a repeater tax. So, in this in this world of the salary cap, it’s not the same. But dude, I’m telling you right now, I can say it all I want. And maybe you can re rationalize, man. Fans don’t want to hear that. It’s not going to comfort anybody. Nobody is going to want to hear that. It’s not one of these things that is is going to get through the rationale of anybody. It’s an emotional thing. People are already um tipping toward some apathy on the team of where they’re at right now. And again, overall solid summer getting pal was good, but this is uh this was a tough one to take right here on the chin. So, we’ll see what goes of it. And and again, I say that as somebody who like I kind of get where the replacement plans were going to go for Heywood Eismith. Um but knowing where the fan base already was, I’m not surprised to see the reaction of this. One guy just goes pathetic. Another guy just tweets to the team you. Another guy says, “Pat and Mickey, time to pack it up.” Lakers fan goes, “Hey, can you pick up Rob Pelinko’s calls about Andrew Wiggins now?” Guy just puts a meme of Tony Soprano that says this. guy says, “Trade a great wing defender on a team that’s been struggling with perimeter defense for a second round pick.” Joke of a franchise. And there’s some worse ones that I’m not going to read, but you guys can go look under the trade. Not uh not a whole lot. I get it. Way to avoid that tax, guys. Not a lot of those. Not a lot of those. Not a lot of people there seeing that. So, um, ultimately, man, Haywood was a, uh, was a baller for the Heat. Loved watching him. Played his ass off. I think does everything that you, you’d want for a guy that you really on your team. And, um, I hope that he has a speedy recovery. I hope that he has a a quick recovery from this injury. and uh and when he does come back is uh is is back to his his old ways of of kicking ass. But um the heat, don’t think this is going to get a lot of fanfare, my

Tobin reacts to news that Heat traded Haywood Highsmith to the Nets with a 2nd round pick to get under luxury tax. Was this always the plan for Miami? Was Highsmith always going to be the cap casualty? Can Keshad Johnson and/or Pelle Larsson step up?
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