Houston Rockets vs. Miami Heat game preview

The Rockets head to South Beach today to face the Miami Heat.

The Heat are 4-1 this season and have looked super impressive in doing so. They have an overtime win in Milwaukee, two comfortable wins over the Hawks, and a blowout win over Memphis. Those kinds of results project them as a good team. They are beating the teams they need to beat and their only loss came on the road in a close loss where Andrew Wiggins went off in the last five minutes.

The big acquisition for the Heat was obviously Jimmy Butler, who was coveted by Daryl Morey and the Rockets in the offseason. Butler wanted his own team and appreciated the Heat culture, so off he went to Miami. Out went Hassan Whiteside in a move most saw coming since, you know, Jimmy Butler can’t stand guys that don’t give 100% all the time.

The Heat are now a who’s who of Rockets killers, including Goran Dragic, Meyers Leonard, and James Johnson. Justice Winslow loves playing his hometown team and Kelly Olynyk can do damage as well. And it’s early, but it appears that Bam Adebayo has made “the leap.” But Miami has gotten incredible contributions early in the season from their rookies: Kendrick Nunn and Tyler Herro.

Nunn has scored 112 points, the highest ever over five games for an undrafted rookie. He dropped 40 on the Rockets in preseason. Herro is one of the best pure shooters to come out of college in a long time, and is averaging 16 per game early in the season. Both should have big nights against Houston.

Blah blah blah...the Rockets don’t play defense, they need to do something about that, why is no one trying...blah blah blah.

You get it.

Tip-off is at 5pm CT