The rumblings that the Miami Heat are a better basketball team without point guard Tyler Herro on the court have grown louder during the team’s grueling practice. Since Herro’s season debut against the Dallas Mavericks on Nov. 24, the Heat have lost five of their eight games, including three of the six contests in which he has suited up.
All of a sudden, the Heat have dropped to 8th in the Eastern Conference while losing four games. Herro has been heavily criticized by many during Miami’s slide, and while the former University of Kentucky star has heard the noise, he’s not too concerned about the narrative.
“Nothing new,” he said. “It is what it is.”
Herro also said the noise doesn’t really bother him. According to him, “real basketball heads know what’s going on.”
“Uh, not really,” Herro said. “I feel like real basketball heads know what’s going on. Twitter stuff is Twitter.”
It’s true that the Heat haven’t been as successful with Herro in the lineup, but he’s still given them great scoring production so far in his seventh NBA campaign. He’s averaging 23.2 points per game on excellent shooting range, shooting 50-plus percent from the field, 40-plus percent from 3-point range and 90-plus percent from the charity stripe.
While he’s been a pretty lackluster playmaker for his teammates since his season debut (he’s averaging just 2.3 assists per game), his job is primarily to score, and he does just that in bunches.
Plus, it’s simply too early to conclude that the Heat are better without Herro on the floor. Herro has only played in six games this season and hasn’t even had much time to settle in, making his season debut a few weeks ago.
If the Heat are still racking up losses in March and April, then that view might be more valid (depending on other factors), but they might be hitting on all cylinders with him leading the way then.
The Heat can stop the bleeding and win their fourth game with Herro this season when they face the Toronto Raptors on December 15th.