Miami’s season started Wednesday at 7:30 in the Kaseya Center against the Detroit pistons. They squeaked out a win with a 103 to 102 victory. Cade Cunningham led the way with thirty points for the Pistons. Bam Adebayo led the team in Scoring with twenty- two.

 After some early success going to Isaiah Stewart and a slow one to eight start to Tyler Herro’s season Miami would soon adjust, opting to play through Bam Adebayo. He had success posting up and playing to his strengths on offense. He even stretched the floor a bit hitting his patented mid range jumper along with establishing a presence defensively. He gathered eight rebounds and two blocks. I have high hopes for Bam Adebayo after a DPOY level season last year. 

Other bright spots in Thomas Bryant, Jaime Jaquez, and Duncan Robinson mended a scoring burst in the 2nd and 3rd Quarters. They would finish with Eight, Six, and fifteen points respectively on the night. Miami led the league last year in bench points, utilizing their savvy veterans to create scoring options. But with a younger reserve this year, I’d like to say the ceiling for this year’s bench is even higher. Jaime specifically, picked up where he left off after positive outings in both the preseason and summer league. But his flaws were just as exposed, For Example his weak perimeter defense against quick guards. This aspect of the game has been a problem for him since the college level, and I wonder how that develops and how Coach Spoelstra will choose to utilize him.

Despite Jimmy Butler and Tyler Herro’s shooting woes, I think they played well as they affected the game in other ways outside of their scoring. Jimmy collected thirteen boards, picked up two steals, and led the team in assists with four on the night. Tyler on the other hand succeeded in passing his steal count with three of his own. Tyler played aggressive and got to spots where he looked comfortable but had trouble getting around the length of the Pistons defense. Their staunch defense led to thirteen blocks of their own.   

The fourth quarter told the story of their defense, slowing down the pistons in the final minutes of the game and creating turnovers making them unable to edge out the Heat. Jalen Duren had been effective on both sides of the floor; defense especially. He finished with four blocks on the night with defensive rookie Ausar Thompson getting five blocks on the night. But Duren and Cade weren’t enough despite their production. 

Overall, it was a night of Miami style basketball. A grind it out game where Bam and Jimmy led defensively to get the win total to a positive one and zero on the night.