The Miami Heat offseason has been defined by the Giannis Antetokounmpo blockbuster and the wait on LeBron James, but the quieter question underneath both is where this roster’s three-point shooting comes from. One answer may already be on the books, writes Ira Winderman of the South Florida Sun Sentinel: Simone Fontecchio.
Fontecchio re-signed with Miami this summer on a one-year, minimum-salary contract, a move that drew little fanfare. Winderman argues the 30-year-old wing has gone somewhat overlooked as a solution to the Heat’s spacing problem. He is a career 36.7% three-point shooter, and he has never played next to a gravity pairing like Antetokounmpo and Bam Adebayo, who should bend defenses enough to leave shooters with the cleanest looks of their careers.
The need is real. The trade that brought Antetokounmpo to Miami sent out Tyler Herro, the team’s most reliable high-volume shooter, along with Kasparas Jakucionis and Kel’el Ware. Team president Pat Riley acknowledged the price this week, telling reporters the Heat “gave up a significant price” before settling the question his own way: “He’s worth it — period.” What the front office bought is the league’s best downhill force; what it still has to assemble is the shooting that makes a Giannis offense breathe. Miami has a long track record of finding rotation value on minimum deals, and Fontecchio fits that pattern more naturally than any external option the capped-out Heat could realistically add.
How large Fontecchio’s role becomes depends partly on James, whose free agency decision is expected soon. If another wing arrives, Fontecchio is insurance; if not, he opens camp with a genuine claim on rotation minutes as the closest thing to a movement shooter on the roster.
For fantasy purposes, Fontecchio is a deep-league and streaming option only for now — a low-usage specialist whose value rides on threes and the occasional efficient scoring week. But his path to 20-plus minutes in a spacing-starved rotation is more plausible than his ADP will suggest, and he is worth a late watch-list spot in leagues that count made threes heavily.
