So while I'd happily bet on them winning a playoff series, I also feel pretty good about them finishing under 50 wins. Lowry would have to really be on one all season long to drag them there. Because Butler's gonna miss his customary 20-25 games.

Like, they were on pace for 45 wins in an 82 game season last year. The question here is... do I think Lowry and Markieff Morris are 4 *regular season* games better than Goran Dragic, Kendrick Nunn, Trevor Ariza, and Precious Achiuwa? Playoff games, I'd def rather have Lowry and Morris... but I'm not convinced those two in and the other four out make the Heat four full regular season wins better than they were last year.

Especially since the majority of the teams in the East got better imo. Of the bottom nine teams in the East last year, the Wizards are the only team I look at and think they definitely won't be better. The bottom five of the West should easily be worse than the bottom five of the East imo.

Bam and Herro will improve... but I suspect they'll do what they did last year again, where they look bad at times, especially early, while they settle for jumpers and figure out some of their rhythms, and then they'll kick it into high gear in order to avoid the play-in.