The end of the 2023-24 season could be considered very unfortunate for Miami Heat guard Terry Rozier.
After playing some of his best basketball since getting traded in late January, Rozier suffered what ultimately was a season-ending neck injury that required him to be in a neck brace. There wasn’t very much clarity from the organization on the injury–including where exactly it stemmed from–but one thing was clear: It was serious.
We got our first real update in nearly two months regarding his status Thursday. According to Heat insider Ethan Skolnick of the Five Reasons Sports Network, Rozier is expected to be fully ready for training camp—expected to open in early October.
“Terry Rozier has been shooting and doing other work,” Skolnick reported. “The Miami Heat expect him to be fully ready for training camp.”
Terry Rozier has been shooting and doing other work, and the Miami Heat expect him to be fully ready for training camp.
More here: https://t.co/izwgN0S6Dy
— Five Reasons Sports 🏀🏈⚾️🏒⚽️ (@5ReasonsSports) July 4, 2024
During his annual end-of-season press conference, Heat president Pat Riley was very open about not wanting to put Rozier in an uncomfortable situation because of how serious neck injuries are to the human body.
“When you’re dealing with the spine, you don’t mess around,” he said. “We were not going to mess around with Terry. He wanted to play desperately and he couldn’t. It’s going to heal and the doctors convinced us and him that, in time, it’s going to heal and he’s alright.”
Rozier, 30, was acquired ahead of last year’s trade deadline from the Charlotte Hornets in exchange for Kyle Lowry and a lottery-protected 2027 first-round pick; the aforementioned pick could roll over to 2028 if the Heat doesn’t make the playoffs next year due to the Stepien Rule and the lottery protections on their 2025 first-rounder it owes to Oklahoma City.
In retrospect, the Heat would’ve had extra draft capital to trade this offseason in addition to flexibility with their mid-level exception if it kept Lowry, though nobody expected Rozier’s neck injury to pop up.
He averaged 16.4 points, 4.2 rebounds and 4.6 assists with the Heat on 42.3 percent shooting, including 37.1 percent from 3-point range (5.7 attempts; 39.6 3PAr) and 91.3 percent from the free-throw line in 31 combined games. The 6-foot-1 guard had a nine-game stretch from March 18-April 4 where he posted 21.2 points on 59.6 percent true shooting, including a 34-point performance with eight 3-pointers against the New York Knicks on April 2.
He’s entering the third year of a four-year, $96.3 million deal he signed in Aug. of 2021. Rozier will have a $24.9 million cap hit this upcoming season with a partially guaranteed $26.6 million deal in 2025-26–though the latter is 93.5 percent guaranteed ($24.9M of $26.6M).
Even though we’re nearly three months removed from his injury, this news is encouraging. Neck injuries are no joke, especially for a shifty, crafty guard with Rozier’s skillset.
***
To check out our other content, click here.
Follow Hot Hot Hoops on Twitter/X here!
Follow Hot Hot Hoops on Instagram here!
Subscribe to our YouTube channel here!
Martin to Sixers, ? HHH was not betting on this scenario. That will leave the Heat with only two solid defenders (Bam and Butler) against Paul Goerge, Maxey, Embid (Sixers), Tatum, Brown, Porzingis,WhiteHoliday (Celtics), Haliburton, Siakam,Toppin (Pacers) just to mention the East not to talk of the West. If the ? Mark stays on HHH, seems the challenge for the Heat this coming season is going to be on the defensive end rather than on the offensive end. Good news is that we are still in the off season!
Martin to Sixers on 4 year deal.
I’m honestly down for the tank. So let all of walk. Maximize minutes for Jaquez, Jovic, Ware and Larsson.
Pat and Mickey trying their hardest to keep the team in mediocrity purgatory, at this point I’m kinda of actively rooting against their vision for the team, because I don’t think it’s good enough.
Maybe at mid season if they continue to strike out and are hanging by a thread to a 7 or 8 seed, they’ll get some for Jimmy and start the full rebuild.
I called him “Low IQ Caleb” for a reason.
The Philadelphia 76ers are finalizing a deal with Caleb Martin, ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski reported on Saturday, less than two hours before the end of the the moratorium period. The contract will reportedly pay Martin more than $32 million over four years (Approximately $8 M per season).
According to Ira Winderman of the South Florida Sun Sentinel, Martin turned down an opt-in-and-extend deal with Miami ahead of free agency. The Heat reportedly offered him a contract that would have paid him $65 million over the next five seasons, including his $7.3 M player option next season ($13M per year average).
A GLASS HALF FULL…
Other than Bam, the only Heat player of any real value around the league is Jimmy Butler. Considering he will soon be 35, like DeRozan, until/unless he proves he is 100% healthy, 100% committed to playing at 100% level for 100% of the games, no team is going to want to pay him anything near what “Playoff Jimmy” might otherwise be worth.
Only after the “Jimmy situation” is resolved, either in the full-time return of “Playoff Jimmy” or in a trade (hopefully, at or near full market value), will Miami be able to move on with a proper re-tooling or re-building process. Meanwhile, any significant trades not involving Butler may not be on the immediate horizon.
Nonethess, I am eager to see what a healthy starting unit can do (Rozier, Herro, Butler, Jovic, Bam) and am actually excited about how our younger players continue developing. I’m particulary interested in seeing how quickly Kel’el Ware can be assimilated into the rotation and how much incremental improvement Jaquez and Jovic are able to make over the summer. Finally, I’m interested is seeing how our second round pic (Larssen), the G Leaguers and undrafted players look this summer.
Speaking of summer, here’s the Heat’s 7-game Summer League schedule, starting with today’s game vs Boston on NBA TV at 6:30PM Eastern. I can’t wait to see how Ware, Larsson and the boys look. https://www.nba.com/heat/schedule
Despite the disappoint in not landing a whale, the glass is still definitely half full!
GO HEAT!!!
It’s really too bad we can’t get DeRozan. I am sure he would have rather come to Miami over Sacramento, who may be the front runner to actually sign him, if we could only pay him something close to his value. It also says a lot about how the rest of the league feels about our tradeable assets, as we apparently can’t even put together a sign and trade even though we are reportedly trying to. Every day that passes jeopardizes that effort. And, the part that sucks the most is our assets are not tradeable, not because they aren’t valuable players, but because they are overpaid. It’s a tough predicament, and one that seemingly prevents us from building a competitive team this year. I mean, we might make the playoffs, although that’s hardly guaranteed unless we upgrade, but let’s just say it would take a massive upset for us to get far.
Still hoping for the best, for some special, magical deal that makes no sense in why the other team helped us out. That’s our best hope.
we got rozier for squat,need another one of those.pat must know somebody in charlotte.i think kuzma could be had for ty or dunc,if this team remains healthy and ware is like lively we can give any team a competitive series but .look at what ny boston ind have done last few years compared to us.i love pat he saved our beloved franchise but sports is a what have u done for me lately biz,pat needs to pull a rabbit out of his hat.dame was screaming miami but ty and dunc not valued enough with amount of $$ theyre being paid.id be happy to get hh back hope he can give us a discount.currently only have one guy on roster that can guard jt jb need another
Yes. Something has to be done.The other teams in the East are very strong now.
One player interests me, and that is Jovic. He gets a lot of very hopeful comments about developing into a useful player. I saw some improvement, but I question if he really is going to be effective as it looks like he is going to be given a big role this year. Sometimes the hype is wrong and yes, sometimes I am wrong. This season we will find out about Jovic. I would rather be wrong because if he can evolve, this team would have a chance. But, after what has happened with a few of our players in the recent past, the Heat needs to know for sure if Jovic is the real deal.
Kuzma plays for Washington, not Charlotte. The Wizards are already have a loser at SG (Jordan Poole). New York went through years/decades of misery. Boston went through a proper rebuild using draft picks and very shrewd trades.
With him on rooster the series with Boston would be a bit less painful. The result would be the same, of course.
We have gone thru so many hopeful moments over the last few years, a good play here and there and we think, hey maybe this player will get really good. And then we get all excited and too quickly think our team will somehow gel. But, this player, Terry Rozier, may be the first player in a while, that the Heat hit on. And to think that we got him while discarding one of the worst miss-steps we have taken over the recent past, makes it all the more fortuitous. Hopefully there are more rabbits to be pulled out of hats. We will need them.
Ware at c. Bam at pf. Jimmy at sf. Dunc at sg haha! and Terry.
Bench: Tyler at pg lol. Bryant, Jovic, Jaime, HH (?)…
Contender? In my fantasy world yes 😜
If bam is not our pf ill be bummed
It will be nice to see “Scary Terry” healthy and ready to start the season. It would awesome to see all our rotation players healthy too. Heat may not be the best team in the league this year but they should be scrappy and competitive. Who knows, if everything gels, the team can stay healthy, Riley can make a strategic trade or two and some of our younger players (Jaquez, Jovic, Ware, Johnson, Pullin, Williams, Swider, etc.) can progress in their development, this team just might be able to do some damage in the playoffs.
GO HEAT!!!
Very happy to see this. We need him.
Yeah this is good news but we need a good backup pg though.
I do not want to see JRich handling the ball for the 2nd unit.
Losing Delon really hurts man, I thought he was a terrific backup pg for us and a real heat culture type guy.
Greatnews.
This is great news. I’m sure he’s ready to ball out for Heat Nation.