MIAMI – The defining moments of the Miami Heat’s season arguably came in April, first when Terry Rozier developed what proved to be a season-ending neck issue a week before the close of the regular season, then when Jimmy Butler suffered a knee injury in the play-in opener, missing the balance of the postseason.
It turned out to be a harbinger of what would follow for the balance of the Eastern Conference playoffs, with the Boston Celtics rampaging to their current 1-0 lead over the Dallas Mavericks in the NBA Finals by then facing injury-depleted rosters from the Cleveland Cavaliers (Donovan Mitchell, Jarrett Allen) and Indiana Pacers (Tyrese Haliburton, Benedict Mathurin).
As the Finals opened, NBA Commissioner Adam Silver addressed the elephant in the playoff room – the absence of star players in the playoffs – in the context of the bigger picture of getting the league’s leading men on the court.
To Silver, even with absences of players such as the Heat’s Butler, who also missed 22 of the regular season’s 82 games, the league’s new requirement of 65 regular-season appearances for postseason award recognition has the NBA positioned in the right direction.
“Look,” Silver said during his annual media session at the NBA Finals, “there’s nothing more important than keeping our players on the floor.
“Whether there’s some connection in terms of additional injuries and playoffs, we don’t know. This is an area that confounds us in some ways, and I will say that we worked with the players successfully in the collective-bargaining agreement on this issue.”
In addition to being without Butler and Rozier for the postseason, the Heat also played the second half of their season in the injury absence of guard Josh Richardson, most of their playoff series with Duncan Robinson limited by a back issue, and then dealt with the absence of rookie Jaime Jaquez Jr. due to a hip flexor strain for the final game of their first-round, five-game ouster at the hands of the Celtics
In the immediate wake of his team being eliminated, Heat President Pat Riley addressed player availability – and his team’s lack thereof – as a prime takeaway from the season.
“The NBA has to address all this,” Riley said, “not just us.”
Silver said at the Finals the league is attempting to do just that, citing his ongoing dialogue with former Heat forward Andre Iguodala, who is serving as executive director of the National Basketball Players Association.
“With Andre’s leadership, sort of a commitment on both sides, let’s keep looking at it,” Silver said. “We have the same incentives, and that is to keep star players on the floor.”
As it is, with the return of Celtics center Kristaps Porzingis from the calf injury sustained in the first round against the Heat, the teams in the Finals are whole and healthy, the first time that has been the case for a Celtics opponent this postseason.
While it might not have seemed it based on the Heat’s season-long parade to the injured list, Silver said injuries to leading men were down this season.
“When it comes to injury data, we’re constantly studying it, trying to see if there’s more than correlation and there’s actually causation,” Silver said. “Of course this past season, even though we had the 65-game rule, largely designed to keep star players on the floor, we had a decrease in injury in star players.
“I’m not standing here saying one followed from the other. It just may be happenstance for this season. I think we saw injuries, of course, in the playoffs this year, but nothing that out of range with injuries we’ve seen in the past.”
Rozier ended the season in a neck brace, while Butler, based on his social media, appears largely recovered from his knee issue. For his part, Robinson was among those in attendance Thursday at TD Garden for Game 1 of the NBA Finals with Richardson earlier this week in attendance at the Miami screening of Bad Boys: Ride or Die.
Silver said having Iguodala involved brings the injury issue the needed perspective of a player.
“One of the of the things I know Andre Iguodala and I, it’s great having him now as the head of the Players Association, just based on his experience as a star player in this league, a championship-caliber player,” Silver said, “that we’re trying to step back and say, ‘What is it that we need to do to incentivize guys to play and keep them healthy, and are there things we need to adjust in the schedule, are there other areas?’ ”
According to the injury tracker at Spotrac.com, the Heat lost 255 player/games to injury this past season, sixth most in the league, for a total of over $42 million in inactive player salary.