This hasn’t, by any means, been a direct path, nothing like during those Big Three years of LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh.
This time, the journey was complex for the Miami Heat, including a four-month NBA shutdown due to a pandemic and a major midseason reshuffling of the mix.
But here they are, back in the NBA Finals for the first time since 2014, a team not quite with the superstar pedigree as the previous five Heat renditions that made it to the league’s championship round, but one with the grit and drive necessary to thrive in basketball in a bubble.