As Hassan Whiteside eyes his preseason debut this weekend, we are finally in line to get our first look at a healthy Miami Heat squad
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After bursting onto the scene a year ago, Hassan Whiteside, the Miami Heat’s projected starting center, is aiming to make his preseason debut this weekend. He’ll have two opportunities to do so, as the Heat plays the Rockets Saturday and the Hawks Sunday.
Whiteside has been battling a calf injury for much of training camp.
Though, it’s probably the goal to get him back Saturday against Houston, as it isn’t likely for the majority of the Heat’s starters to play in the second game of a preseason back-to-back on Sunday.
Why is it so important that he returns this weekend? Including this weekend’s games, the Miami Heat only have four preseason games left – and the team’s projected starting lineup has played ZERO minutes together. The combination of Goran Dragic, Dwyane Wade, Luol Deng, Chris Bosh and Hassan Whiteside has not played together not just this preseason, but EVER.
During this preseason, Dragic and Bosh finally experienced playing together for the first time, but they still haven’t played together with Whiteside, which is actually quite impressive. Nevertheless, the team and Whiteside hope that ends this weekend.
"[via Sun-Sentinel]So Haslem again started for the third time in as many exhibitions, and Whiteside again looked on considering the possibilities, the Heat’s projected starting five still never having played a minute together. Ever.“We’re shooting for a couple more days off and then slowly try to get a practice or so in this week and see how things go,” Whiteside said before the game, hopeful of possibly making his exhibition debut this weekend."
Whiteside averaged 12 points, 10 rebounds and 2.5 blocks per game last season with the Miami Heat. Perhaps most impressively, he finished the year with a 26.26 PER.
While questions loom as to whether or not Whiteside can build – and maintain – on the year that he had last season, there’s no question that the Miami Heat simply want to see him put this injury behind him and back on the basketball court.
It also wouldn’t hurt for them to get a first look at their team completely healthy and in the lineup together.
After a very successful summer, the Miami Heat emerged as one of the potential dark horse teams to challenge LeBron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers in the Eastern Conference. However, we still haven’t even begun to see what this team to be with Whiteside in the lineup – and that’s kind of important.
The key with this team will certainly be health, but even if healthy the team is going to need Whiteside to be better than he was last season in order for them to really defy expectations.
It appears, at least for the time being, that we could, for the first time this season, finally get our first glimpse of what the Miami Heat might look like this season.