The Miami Heat performed well in the NBA draft last year, utilizing a mid-first-round pick to choose UCLA’s Jaime Jaquez Jr., a four-year college veteran with plug-and-play ability. The Heat plugged him in.
And he played, totaling 2,113 minutes, ranking second on the club.
A year later, the Heat could look to accomplish much the same, as predicted by ESPN:
According to the site’s most recent mock draft, the Miami Heat will select four-year Purdue star Zach Edey in next month’s draft.
Cable, his limited offensive skill has some NBA professionals wondering if he should even be drafted in the first round. Other mocks mirror this as well:
The Athletic has Edey ranked 21st, Bleacher Report has him 23rd, the Ringer has him 25th, and CBS has him 27th.
But the draft is shallow, and Edey is at least a known commodity, having won the Naismith Player of the Year Award. This could help him stand out among win-now clubs with mid- to late-first-round picks, much like Jaquez did for the Heat last season.
Is the Miami Heat signing another four-year college player? ESPN’s Jonathan Givony wrote about Edey’s potential move to the Miami Heat, noting that he and center Bam Adebayo would be an uneasy match. Nonetheless:
“Edey’s positional fit with Bam Adebayo would be debated in Miami, but the Heat would appreciate his productivity, physicality, intensity, and team-culture fit. Adebayo began to gradually incorporate a 3-point shot into his offensive repertoire late this season, and he possesses the defensive versatility that may be valuable alongside another big.
Edey’s offensive rebounding and interior scoring are strengths that the Heat lack, making him an appealing option here.”
He can clearly score in the paint and rebound—at 7-foot-4, he averaged 25.2 points and 12.2 rebounds while shooting 62.3% from the field. Edey led Purdue to the national championship game this year and has fans among coaches and front offices.
“He does all the little things well,” one Western Conference scout stated.
“He sets pretty nice screens; he sees the court and can handle double teams.
And he completed all of the tasks assigned to him at Purdue.
He came off the bench, he did not have plays named for him, and he simply performed his job.
That is going to matter in the NBA.
But Edey is a plodder with little athleticism to play on the perimeter or at either end of the floor, which is difficult to overcome in today’s game.
“That’s the problem,” the scout told Heavy Sports.
“I believe everyone likes the child and understands what he can do. However, it is difficult to predict where he will develop and improve.
There are big guys who don’t shoot threes—Mitchell Robinson, Jarrett Allen, (Ivica) Zubac—but that’s not the issue.
You should be able to get up and down the floor. You can’t be an anchor on the fast break; you can’t drag everything down.
And defensively, it’s more than just going out and guarding 3-pointers. It is playing in space, going through screens repeatedly.
It’s simply too easy to pick him apart. It’s an old joke: he has the size of a skyscraper and the athleticism of one as well.”
Because of his size, college accomplishments, and the general inferiority of this selection, Edey has a possibility to be selected in the first round, perhaps even in the middle, by the Miami Heat.
However, it is unlikely that he will be as prolific as Jaquez was as a rookie.
Sean Deveney is an experienced sports reporter who covers the NBA, NFL, and MLB for Heavy.com.
He has been writing for Heavy since 2019 and has over two decades of experience covering the NBA, including 17 years as the lead NBA reporter for the Sporting News.
Deveney is the author of seven nonfiction works, including “Fun City,” “Before Wrigley became Wrigley,” and “Facing Michael Jordan.”
Leave a Reply