By acquiring Shane Battier, Miami Heat added some much needed depth to their roster, but come Christmas night, the wingman might not play …
A shortened NBA season is starting on Sunday night and although five games are scheduled for the night, all eyes would be on the game between the last year’s NBA finalists - Miami Heat and Dallas Mavericks.
Dallas humiliated the Heat in the finals and although it’s just a regular season game, the wounded and more fluent Heat are likely to go all out against the Mavs, who have seen many changes to their championship winning roster.
Miami have also made some changes to their squad during the free agency, but they have been in the form of acquisitions mostly. The Heat centre Eddy Curry and Shane Battier early in the agency, but come this Sunday, the duo will
be on the sidelines.
Heat have already ruled out Curry because of a hip injury and the team will make a last minute decision on the inclusion of the Shane Battier, who is also nursing an injury. Both players missed all the practice sessions since the
training camps started on 9th December and although Battier had almost an hour of on-court work last Thursday and Friday, Eric Spoelstra, the Heat coach, has revealed that the final decision to include Battier in the lineup would be taken after
looking at his fitness level on a Saturday practice session.
Battier pulled his left thigh muscle just before the training camps started and that kept him out of the team’s two preseason games against the Orlando Magic. He himself is not sure whether his thigh has recovered fully or not.
"How about a strong maybe?" Battier responded when asked about his status for Sunday's game. "I'm going to try to practice tomorrow and see how it goes. It's progressing well. But with an injury like this, you don't really know
where you are until you're in the heat of battle and you have to react and change directions, cut hard and stop hard. You can't simulate that in shooting drills on the side."
Battier was roped into the team to add some much needed depth to the Miami bench. He is a tough option on a D, stretches the floor well and can also nail 3’s at will. Most importantly, he can provide a much needed cover for James,
who played major minutes last season.
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