Inside the System: How Miami Built an Effective Offense Without a Star Creator

Daniel Waddleton

Nov 2, 2025

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DESPITE BEING REGARDED as one of the best coaches in the NBA, Erik Spoelstra has quietly found himself on the wrong side of a trend. His Miami Heat teams have spent four of the last six seasons -- including each of the past three -- in the bottom third of the league in offensive efficiency.

The breaking point appeared to come last postseason against Cleveland, when the Heat’s offense sputtered to just a 102.7 offensive rating in a four-game sweep. The offense legitimately looked lifeless.

There was no single offensive savior coming. The Kevin Durant trade fell through, free agency was a ghost town, and well, Nico Harrison already traded Luka Dončić. If Miami’s offense was going to evolve, it would have to come from within.

So Spo did something that others of his stature might not be willing to do: he asked for help.

The call went out to Noah LaRoche, a former Memphis Grizzlies assistant known for installing a motion-based system that traded pick-and-roll volume for a freer, more egalitarian style of play. LaRoche’s approach helped Memphis finish sixth in offense last season, even if the experiment ended abruptly when Ja Morant reportedly pushed back, preferring to return to a high pick-and-roll scheme that suited his own game.

Still, there was proof of concept. Spoelstra saw a system that didn’t rely on heliocentric creation -- one that emphasized pace, driving gaps, and collective movement -- and thought, Why can’t we do that?

Despite having a defensively slanted team, he believed Miami had the personnel for it: physical, downhill wings, skilled grab-and-go bigs, and, maybe most importantly, a roster wired to sacrifice usage for the bigger picture.

EARLY RETURN HAVE been promising. Standing at 3-2, Miami currently ranks 9th in offensive rating (116.8) and 6th in half-court points per possession (101.2) which is great efficiency for a roster without a traditional advantage creator.

Similar to the trends we saw in Memphis last year, this LaRoche-kissed offense runs pick-and-rolls on just 11.3% of possessions, easily the fewest in the league (for comparison, the second-lowest team runs nearly double that at 24.8%).

With pick-and-roll and dribble handoffs more prevalent than ever, teams spend countless hours refining their principles to defend those actions. So Spoelstra essentially asked a simple question: if we don’t have someone on the floor who’s elite at operating those play types, why follow the league’s blueprint with inferior talent?

That’s where this offense comes in, sidestepping the most over-scouted actions in the league. And so if they’re not running pick-and-roll… where are the shots coming from?

Here's the play-type distribution:

• Spot-ups: 2nd in frequency (31.4%)

• Isolations: 5th (9.1%)

• Transition: 1st (23.4%)

• Post-ups: 1st (7.1%) -- though when including passes, just 26th, showing they’re scoring out of the post, not facilitating.

• Off-ball screens: 10th (4.0%)

The biggest key so far has been tempo. They play with the fastest pace in basketball (107.3), pushing early and often to get shots up before the defense sets. Every possession feels like a race to create, whether it’s getting an easy shot in transition or mismatch hunting after a cross-match. They push after misses, makes, turnovers, even on side out-of-bounds.

Their shot clock data screams aggression. Miami is the second-most frequent team shooting between 22-18 seconds and the third-most between 18-15. They’re dead last in late-clock shots. Teams are getting scored on before they can digest their own offensive possession.

Make or miss, Miami Heat are elite at capitalizing on advantages created by pace. In 5-on-4 situations -- often triggered when a defender either falls or is late getting back because of Miami’s tempo -- they’re lethal. Lanes are filled instantly and they both have great feel for sealing defenders in transition for dunks, and spraying the ball out to shooters before the defense can normalize.

Once they get into the halfcourt they aren’t running plays, they’re operating out of concepts. NBA on Prime’s postgame show (a huge success so far) actually had Miami Heat players Bam Adebayo and Norman Powell on to break down the intricacies of the offense. The core idea is simple: constantly reshape the floor in order to open up driving lanes and occupy help defenders.

They will toggle between five-out spacing and four-out with somebody in the deep dunker’s spot ready to vacate at any moment. They leave the elbows empty at all times, creating wide runways for drivers. When someone attacks, everyone else rotates around them like spokes on a wheel, filling behind the drive, sliding along the arc, or 45-cutting through the lane to draw help defense. Just watch the other four players without the ball in these clips.

Their cutting isn’t used to score, it’s designed to manipulate help. They rank near the bottom of the league in points generated directly off cuts, but almost every drive they create is juiced by those disguised movements.

Watch this possession: Bam Adebayo’s initial baseline cut vacates the strong side, clearing space for Davion Mitchell to go to work. Then Larson’s 45 cut occupies Austin Reaves, who would’ve been responsible for the first pass on the drive when Jaxson Hayes helps, and Rui Hachimura is forced into the weakside crack-down.

Sometimes we even see the adverse affect on these strong side cuts -- drawing help, flipping the geometry of the floor, and creating an overloaded weak-side advantage.

They’ll mix in off-ball action like wide pins or staggers, mostly to get Norman Powell movement shots or to get wings attacking downhill. However the philosophy remains the same: actions are there just to grease the wheels of the offense, not to script the possession.

Although the offense is egalitarian the passing is never excessive, always coming with intention. Miami Heat sit middle-of-the-pack in total passes, but nearly every one either advances the ball up the floor, comes directly off dribble penetration, or is a "one-more" pass for an even more open shot. There’s no wasted player or ball movement, which is integral for an offense trying to become more than the sum of its parts.

ALL OF THIS is nice in theory, but you also need the personnel to pull it off. Luckily for Miami, they’re built for it.

It starts with their bigs -- Bam Adebayo, Nikola Jović, and Kel’el Ware -- who operate as initiators despite their size and position. These are grab-and-go players who rebound the ball and immediately turn into ball-handlers, sparking offense before the defense is set. Bam specifically has become the central hub of this unique offense. His handle and passing feel really pop for a 6'10 big. Even though he leads the team in usage, the offense never feels like it’s catering to him. It flows because he’s the one keeping it alive.

In the half-court, Miami’s wings are perfect for the system. Norman Powell has been one of the big early winners -- 24 PPG on 66.5% true shooting -- thriving in the world this offense creates: catch-and-shoot opportunities, attacking closeouts, and just overall punishing rotating defenses on the second side.

Jaime Jaquez Jr. has quietly become the half-court engine, a herky-jerky bruiser who can bump defenders off their spot while keeping his dribble alive, getting two feet in the paint, and either scoring with touch and footwork or making the next read. His drives create the chain reactions Miami relies on.

He’s averaging 16.2 points and 4.6 assists on 68% true shooting and unsurprisingly has a huge on/off impact. Although Jaquez has been the more polished initiator, Andrew Wiggins has benefited from the same spacing and mismatch opportunities with his similar skill set.

Both these big wings, along with many other players on the roster attack crossmatches relentlessly. Miami leverages its pace to generate these mismatches, then capitalizes before the defense can bring help. They even steal offensive rebounds off these situations because of the size advantage they create.

The only game so far where they leaned into pick-and-roll was crunch time of the Knicks game, and New York appeared unprepared for the sudden shift. With Miami straying so far away from your typical pick-and-roll, it seems teams can have their coverages screwed up. I don’t expect this to become a staple of their late-game offense, but it’s nice to know it's still a lever they can pull.

FOR THE FIRST time in years, Miami’s offense doesn’t feel like a patchwork of surviving possessions. It feels intentional and modern. Spo tore the system down to the studs and built something that finally reflects who Miami actually is, this fast but physical, individual but unselfish group.

It’ll be really interesting when Tyler Herro returns. I have zero doubt he can thrive in this system, but he’s also going to want some of his pick-and-roll ball-handler usage back. Finding the right balance -- letting him regain some of that control while still keeping him plugged into this .5-second decision-making machine -- is going to be Spo’s next task as he pulls Miami out of the offensive mud.

It’s also worth remembering that this team doesn’t have to win with offense. They’re a defense-first roster. Even if the offense dips slightly in efficiency as teams adjust to this new style, the whole purpose of this approach is that Miami throw out elite defensive lineups and stay comfortably afloat on the other end. A small setback won’t sink them, because the defense -- which currently ranks third in the league at 108.9 points per 100 -- is their foundation.

That’s what makes this so impressive: Spo built a legitimately good offense out of a defensive-tilted roster simply by getting creative, something a lot of coaches struggle with.

With all that said, I can’t stress enough that this isn’t some gimmick. It’s a whole new operating system, and it actually works. We’ll see what an 82-game sample ultimately says, but right now, everything points in the right direction.