Heat point guard Kyle Lowry still won’t reveal the specifics of the family situation that caused him to miss nine games in January and February, and he tells Doug Smith of The Toronto Star that it hasn’t been fully resolved. Lowry said the issue continued to be a distraction even after he resumed playing.
“It’s definitely something that kind of derailed my whole season and kept me derailed for a long time,” Lowry said. “Still to this day, it’s still something I deal with every single day, I actually got a phone call just now about it. It’s life, life happens and you just have to continue to get better and focus on the things you can control and try to help as best you can because at the end of the day, I can’t do this or that, all I can do is go to people who can help me and hopefully I can help them and we can kind of work together and collaborate.”
Lowry was in Toronto today to take part in the Nick Nurse Foundation golf tournament. Even though he chose to leave the Raptors in free agency last summer, Lowry has remained friendly with his former coach.
“Nick’s a friend of mine and we got closer and closer and as the years went on we trusted each other more and more,” Lowry said. “To keep a relationship with a guy like him, obviously I’m here for a reason, he’s such a great man, he’s helped me in my career tremendously and all I can do is try to give back as much to him as he’s given to me.”
There’s more on the Heat:
- Miami would be interested in bringing back versatile forward Jae Crowder, but there’s no easy way to match salaries in a trade with the Suns, tweets Barry Jackson of The Miami Herald. Crowder, who is entering the final year of his contract, raised some eyebrows this week when he tweeted, “Change is inevitable.. Growth is optional.!! I believe its time for a change… I wanna continue growing!” Although Crowder doesn’t specify that he’s talking about basketball, the message has led to speculation that he wants to play somewhere else.
- Omer Yurtseven will have to improve defensively to earn regular playing time, per Ira Winderman of The Sun-Sentinel. Winderman adds that the Heat view Yurtseven as a backup to starting center Bam Adebayo, but he’ll have to compete with Dewayne Dedmon for those minutes.
- First-round pick Nikola Jovic won’t play for the Serbian national team in the World Cup qualifier or EuroBasket, according to Winderman (Twitter link). Jovic will focus on preparing for Miami’s training camp, which starts in late September. Yurtseven is also expected to bypass international competitions with Turkey (Twitter link).
Draymond can replace PJ Tucker or Crowder
Heat need to find a third team and trade for Draymond
In my dreams. I hoped there was a chance a couple of years ago, but it’s not happening. They should have just drafted him when it was between him and Moultrie/trading the pick
Why did they let Crowder go in the first place??? He had played so well in the bubble postseason Final run… :(
He took less money for more years mlm they didnt let him go. They offered him more money
Crowders become a true pro much like tucker, can see him getting a nice contract after next season
Kenneth Faried. To me he is what Tucker and Crowder are. He plays D, rebs. And can guard multiple positions. His shooting may not be as good. But he still gets pts.
Career avg 11.4 pts, 8.1 reb.
Is better than Tucker or Crowder. Heat should be all over this guy. Currently playing in Russia, 32 yrs old.
Tucker 5.6 reb, 7.1 pts career
Crowder 4.3 reb, 9.6 pts career
Faried is more like a younger, less useful defensively, none jumpshooting UD. We dont really need a replacement for him. He should be back
Jovic just needs to play as much basketball as possible, though he probably just didnt even make the team b/c if where he is at this point…
Yurtseven is actually at least adequate defensively, but he obviously just doesnt defend pick and roll well. I’ve talked about it many times, but I think the real main things he needs to work on are making quicker decisions/not turning the ball over as easily in the paint/post, not fouling, and hopefully showing more of the floor spacing ability he showed in summer league last year. If he can make shots like that, I think he gets a spot, and could even be used in some lineups with Bam against certain matchups. I think he could be extremely useful in the 2nd unit against certain matchups as well, as a guy that can get them some easy baskets on heavy amount of touches
I dont see any way the Heat can trade for Crowder, as I’ve been saying for a long time. I wish, but they literally dont have the contracts to do so to match. Phoenix did retain their depth at the 3/4 spots, so I could maybe see them moving him, but I dont think that would be too smart, as they still have a good roster coming int on the year, and addressed the floor spacing big they missed when they lost Kaminsky, didnt let Jalen Smith play, Saric was injured, and they replaced those guys with Javale.
I would love to have Crowder back next offseason though. That would be awesome
Crowder is overrated by Heat fans based on 20 reg season games where he was hot +21 playoff games where he wasn’t over 3 years ago.
His numbers as a playoff starter were mediocre, 12 ppg on 40%/34.2% shooting 5.6 rpg 1.9 apg +/- of -1.2
The guy is 32, getting double figure scoring from him going forward is unlikely.
Scoring doesn’t matter. It’s what he could do defensively at the 4/3. Ya he is streaky with the jumpshot, but he still can knock them down enough, and that is a position that outside of Crowder and PJ Tucker has been an issue for years