6 Thoughts
1) Meaningless win - but a thriller, with Heat backup point guard Chris Quinn leading a late game surge by dropping 5 triples in the fourth quarter and overtime to pull out the win. Twenty-six for Quinn. Miami finishes 43-39, officially, fifth place in the East. We at Dos Minutos had them projected at 31-51 so this is, you know, better. Playoffs in the ATL this weekend.
2) Two things that should never happen in a meaningless game: 1) overtime; 2) a flagrant foul. Someone forgot to give The Big Cat, Jamal Magloire, the memo. His second quarter tomahawk to the face of Walter Herman was, ummm, excessive. I'm not sure Jamal knew the game was meaningless - after the game he told sideline reporter Jason Jackson that he and the rest of the bench "had to step up tonight because we had a lot of guys out - we can't let that be an excuse." Umm, it is an excuse - those guys were all held out on purpose because the game was meaningless. Ah, well, it was a beautiful season for The Big Cat - after several years in the wilderness, he transformed himself into a reasonable facsimile of an NBA backup center. Good for him, he seems like a nice guy - besides all the vicious, unnecessary fouls, at least.
3) Dwyane Wade took the night off and won the scoring title at 30.2 points a game. That's another trophy for his mantle. On the one hand, he took a lot of shots. On the other hand, he made a high percentage of them. On another hand, there were no other quality scorers he had to share the ball with, but also, because of this, he faced multiple defenders every night. That's something to mention, actually - Miami is the second youngest team in the NBA. Wade, Haslem, and Jermaine O'Neal have been around - every other nightly rotation player is in his first or second season. But, because Miami has Wade, they always get the other team's A effort. When your 'other' average young playoff team comes to town, say a Chicago, no one is overly jacked to see them - but Wade's presence ratchets it up a whole 'nother level. That's a lot of pressure for these young guys - Wade takes pressure off of them because he is so good; but they always see an intense opponent every night. That will make the kids better in the long run. One more thing - DWade missed only one game this season before taking the last two off - that, more than anything, made Miami's season.
4) Beasley - ridiculous again. 22 points in only 19 minutes - I don't think he even touched the rim, he was ripping the net from everywhere. Then nearly had his eye poked out of its socket by Amir Johnson, ending his night a couple of minutes early. Team said he's fine. That's five straight 20 point nights for Beasley. Ended up averaging a shade under 14 points a game in a shade under 25 minutes. That's insane production for a rookie who didn't really have a play run for him all year.
5) Tip of the cap, also, to Emcee Chalmers, the only starter to play the last two games. As a rookie second round draft pick, he started all 82 games. Not many guys in NBA history have done that - especially as a point guard, the toughest position to learn on the fly. He finished fourth in the league in steals, and shot a respectable 37% on threes. I don't know that he is a long-term frontline NBA starter, but he is already a respectable player, and would be a great backup, even for a contender. He has a chance, though, to be a good player in this league.
6) The Captain coming out this week with a new position paper: strongly opposed to the Somali pirates. I can see the argument either way. I feel, though, that this was a solid and necessary decision for The Captain, whose reputation is still reeling in some quarters ever since his 1996 statement supporting the Unabomber.
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