The results from the MRI are in and it is not good.
Chris Bosh will be out “indefinitely” with a strained abdominal muscle suffered in the first half of the Heat’s Game 1 win over the Indiana Pacers Sunday, the Heat have announced. The reason for no timeline is that these injuries are very hard to predict, based on severity and other factors. Most likely he is out for this series at least.
As we said in a more detailed post, this likely does not hurt the Heat too much in this series — although Indiana’s size advantage with Roy Hibbert in the paint just got bigger and you can bet they will work to exploit it more. The Pacers are not an easy out.
For Miami, everyone just moves up a chair. LeBron James will now play more time at the four spot, with Ronny Turiaf and Joel Anthony splitting time at the five, plus Udonis Haslem will have to step up. When the Heat had to go to those lineups during the regular season they still outscored their opponents (their regular starting lineup but with Shane Battier for Bosh was +3.3 per 48 minutes), just not by as much as when Bosh was on the floor (+6 per 48 with starters). It’s like that however you cut it up. Put simply, no matter what your local talk radio host says, the Heat are not better off without Bosh — the numbers across the board show they take a step back without him.
Again, the Heat should still get past a good but not yet good enough Pacers team. And while the Celtics or Sixers present new challenges in the next round. The Heat may be without Bosh but likely still would be good enough to advance.
But beyond that… the Heat will try to cross that bridge when the come to it. But if the Thunder are by that bridge the Heat are going to need Bosh.
