A: I really wanted to move on from this, but since Erik Spoelstra again addressed it Friday, I'll bite. To me it comes down to the basic premise that if you sign on with the Heat, you know you are going to work. It's not as if Ray Allen was locked into some sort of lengthy contract and all of a sudden the Heat's culture changed. And by then, this team had gone out of its way to rest players, with nothing more pronounced than the Dwyane Wade maintenance program. As I wrote, the Heat dramatically reduced their practice and shootaround schedule over the second half of 2013-14, after three consecutive trips to the NBA Finals and a fourth visit on the way. (Part of that was James Jones and Ray Allen adhering to the letter of the law when it came to NBA guidelines for practice.) What also was well known was somewhat of a fracturing in the locker room, with LeBron James declining that season to commit to a Heat future (and then leaving for the Cavaliers that summer). What the team needed was an exhale. They got that after winning the second game of those Finals against the Spurs -- and then not winning again.