With a quarter of the season already in the books, the tempered concerns associated with the Miami Heat’s early-season struggles have progressed into legitimate worries that this team could miss the playoffs.
The fact that the Heat have played the NBA’s easiest schedule to date only adds to that unease.
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Entering the season, the Heat were expected to win around 44 games, same as a year ago. A record that was good enough to net the Heat a sixth seed in a middling Eastern Conference. They will now need to outperform some of those expectations to make up for a such a slow start.
Going forward Miami will face the 15th-most difficult schedule, a tall task for an average team which has now placed itself behind the eight ball. However, if the Heat are able to get relatively healthy, they still have plenty of time to mount a playoff push.
As it sits now, the Heat could be battling their in-state rival Orlando Magic, as well as the Charlotte Hornets, for the final playoff spot in the Eastern Conference.
It is also worth watching how Detroit and Washington finish the season, as both of those teams have outperformed their expectations by quite a bit to this point. If those teams regress as expected, this could become a very crowded race for the last couple of playoff spots in the East.
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