With Jimmy Butler leaving the Miami Heat for the Golden State Warriors, the franchise are in need of a new face. Tyler Herro and Bam Adebayo are great secondary stars but there are serious doubts about whether they can lead a winning team.
This season is the perfect example of that. With Butler rarely playing or performing well in recent times, this was the perfect opportunity for Herro and Adebayo to step up.
To be fair, Herro has to a large extent and is averaging 24.1 points this season. But even now, he does not feel like the primary option.
On the other hand, after a slow start to the season, Adebayo has found his form again but he is not really performing at the level he was in the previous campaign.
Many had expected this to be the season when Adebayo finally stepped up and made the Heat his team. He has failed to do that.
Thus, do not be surprised if the Heat try to bring in a superstar in the summer to be the next face of the franchise. Could LaMelo Ball be that guy?
Zach Buckley wrote in his article ‘Imagining Every NBA Team’s Top 3 Offseason Trade Targets’ on Bleacher Report: “Miami would need to find star power to abandon the save-for-2026 plan, and Ball would provide that in spades. He’d also address a years-long itch for additional scoring and creation on the perimeter. There would be defensive concerns with a Ball-Herro backcourt, but the offensive upside is enormous (and at least some of those concerns would be alleviated by Adebayo’s presence behind them).”
Ball has shown elite potential on the Charlotte Hornets. This season, he is averaging 26.3 points per game.
Also, he is just an incredibly entertaining player to watch. The type who can be the face of a franchise for years to come.
There are some concerns surrounding Ball though. The first has to be his injury problems. Last season, he played 22 games. The one before that, he featured 36 times. This season, he has already missed 22 games.
Then there comes the win factor. While Ball is a tremendous individual player, there is no guarantee that he can be part of a winning unit simply because the Hornets have never really been competitive.