One former Miami Heat big man seems to prefer the Enrique Iglesias song “Hero” to the basketball player “Herro.”
Appearing Friday on ESPN’s “First Take,” retired ex-NBA All-Star Amar’e Stoudemire targeted Heat guard Tyler Herro after Miami fell in Game 2 of the Eastern Conference Finals to the Boston Celtics.
“Where’s his focus?” asked Stoudemire of Herro. “He wants to wear the shades. He wants to have his back out in the press conference. He wants to do the gun show. He wants all this entertainment stuff. But where is the focus on basketball?
“After the [NBA] bubble [in Orlando], he had a great run in the bubble,” Stoudemire added. “But ever since then, where’s the ‘hero’?”
The 22-year-old Herro put up 18 points in Miami’s Game 1 victory over the Celtics with head coach Erik Spoelstra crediting Herro for keeping the Heat in the game during the first half. In Game 2, Herro finished with 11 points but had a team-worst plus-minus of -33.
Even so though, Stoudemire’s criticism sounds like cap. It was fair to go at Herro for his fairly mediocre sophomore season after his excellent rookie showing in the bubble. Even the Heat sounded concerned at one point. But Herro just won NBA Sixth Man of the Year in a landslide (averaging a stout 20.7 points, 5.0 rebounds, and 4.0 assists per contest). Herro has also been bringing it in the postseason thus far with multiple outings of 20-plus points across both of Miami’s previous playoff series, despite Jimmy Butler taking on a much larger scoring load.
Stoudemire, who played for the Heat during his final NBA season in 2015-16, has appeared frequently on ESPN lately. Perhaps this is Stoudemire’s way of asserting himself as a hot take specialist. After all, he has recently had some “get off my lawn” moments with players on other teams too.
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