While Miami Heat guard Tyler Herro got off to a roaring start to begin his 2023-24 season before suffering an ankle injury, Herro’s off to the most efficient start of his career to begin 2024-25, so much so that he’s been the team’s best player through nine games. Heat head coach Erik Spoelstra praised Herro’s early efforts after his 26-point performance in the team’s one-point win over Minnesota Sunday.
“He’s becoming so efficient,” Spoelstra told reporters Sunday. “Tyler kept us afloat at so many points during the game. And it also created some overreactions–opposing teams have to scheme against him. They have to sometimes put two on the ball or extend all the way to halfcourt. I thought he managed that pressure throughout the course of the game very well.
“I was really pleased with his decision-making, his playmaking and his scoring.”
Spoelstra even went onto credit Herro’s screen–specifically on Nikola Jovic’s game-winning layup, where Herro screened 7-foot center Rudy Gobert to free Jovic–causing a miscommunication on the switch.
Through nine games to begin the 2024-25 season, Herro’s averaging 23.2 points, 5.2 rebounds and 5.0 assists on 50.7 percent shooting, including 45.6 percent from 3-point range and 81.8 percent from the free-throw line. He’s modified his short profile, essentially turning all of his long 2s into either short-2s or 3s.
And thus, efficiency! His 65.9 percent true-shooting percentage would be a career-high by nearly 10 percentage points while his assist percentage (27.7) is better by over five points.
Jimmy Butler, Terry Rozier and Bam Adebayo have all had disappointing starts, and Herro’s kept them somewhat afloat, even though they’re still a bottom-half offense with a middling NET Rating. Herro being the Heat’s best player is both an indictment of how good he’s been, plus an indictment of how bad Butler and Adebayo–the team’s two best players–have been as well.
Should he continue this trend without getting injured, there’s no telling whether or not he could earn his first career All-Star nod or, better yet, make third-team All-NBA! The Heat certainly need his production … as well as them needing their other top players to step up.
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The course of not starting Ware spo just been putting the heat in a hole ion think spo be thinking