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Goran Dragic's 5-year, $90M deal turns Heat focus squarely to Dwyane Wade

One half of this backcourt's set to return. Will the other? (Issac Baldizon/NBAE/Getty Images)
One half of this backcourt's set to return. Will the other? (Issac Baldizon/NBAE/Getty Images)

Pat Riley never got to see the team he rebuilt this past February take the floor. Injuries and circumstance conspired to keep his Miami Heat working at less than 100 percent capacity en route to a lottery finish, and he really wanted a shot at seeing how the on-court reality matches up with the version he envisioned.

"I would like to see standing strong," Riley told reporters in a season-wrapping press conference after capping a 37-45 season that saw Miami miss the postseason for the first time since 2008. "Luol Deng, Hassan Whiteside, and Chris Bosh, Goran Dragic, Dwyane Wade, with Mario Chalmers coming off the bench, with Josh McRoberts."

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There's still work to be done, but after Deng opted into the final year of his contract on Monday, Riley took a major second step on Wednesday, agreeing to lay out $90 million of Heat owner Micky Arison's scratch to keep Dragic — the hard-charging Slovenian point guard, whom Riley imported from the Phoenix Suns at February's trade deadline — in South Florida over the next five years, according to Yahoo Sports NBA columnist Adrian Wojnarowski. Dragic will hold a player option for the fifth season, allowing him to opt out and re-enter unrestricted free agency in the summer of 2019.

After wrapping the four-year, $30 million contract he signed in the summer of 2012, that's a major-league come-up for the 29-year-old lefty, who won the league's Most Improved Player award in 2013-14 and was named to the All-NBA Third Team that season for his work on the surprising 48-win Suns. The elevation in pay grade did not escape the notice of teammate Whiteside, who extended a hand in congratulations — and something else — on Wednesday morning:

Hang in there, Hassan. Your payday's coming next summer.

As weighty a deal as that is, it's still technically speaking something of a discount in terms of average annual value, if you think Dragic could've netted a max deal elsewhere:

Regardless, his return puts Riley and head coach Erik Spoelstra in position to feature one of the more intriguing starting lineups in the Eastern Conference.

Deng's back in the mix on the wing after quietly averaging 14 points, five boards and two assists per game in his first season in Miami. Whiteside will man the middle from day one after becoming one of the more revelatory reclamation projects in recent league history. Anticipated centerpiece Bosh is expected to return fully healthy after the discovery of blood clots on his lung ended his season.

Dragic, who averaged 16.6 points, 5.3 assists and 3.4 rebounds in 34.8 minutes per game in 26 appearances with the Heat, will see the lion's share of the work on the ball, attacking the basket in transition and off drives sprung by Whiteside screens, and will finally get the opportunity to pair up with Bosh in a pick-and-pop game that could stretch defenses vertically and horizontally. McRoberts could well be back in the fold after missing all but 17 games of his first season in Miami with various injuries, providing another versatile playmaking forward to help goose an offense that finished 22nd in the league in offensive efficiency last season. The Heat look to get another second-unit boost on the wing from rookie Justise Winslow, who profiled as one of the steals of the 2015 draft after falling to the Heat with the No. 10 overall pick.

The key question, then, is whether the longest-tenured member of the Heat, and arguably the greatest player in franchise history, will wind up coming back, too.

Dwyane Wade, you'll recall, opted out of the final year of his existing contract on Monday, reportedly looking for a three-year deal worth somewhere between $16 million per year and a maximum $20 million per year as a means of recouping some of the money he's sacrificed over the years to help Riley lure other talent to make the Heat a championship contender. Dragic's willingness to take less than his full max opens up some more available cash for Wade, but with the point guard back in the fold, the Heat look likely to be right up against the 2015-16 salary cap — now projected at $69 million — even before inking Wade, and could put Miami in dire straits with respect to the luxury tax line, as Sports Illustrated's Rob Mahoney writes:

While we don’t yet know the exact structure of the deal (save that the last year is a player option), Dragic’s compromise may have allowed the Heat to format his salary to level out or even dip in 2016-17 when Hassan Whiteside will enter free agency without full Bird rights and the pursuit of Kevin Durant will begin in earnest.

To squeeze the salaries of Dragic, Wade, Whiteside, and an impact free agent under even the vaulted 2016-17 salary cap will require real ingenuity. That very mix will also, in the interim, likely send the reluctant Heat into luxury tax territory unless they manage to shed salary. Chris Andersen, Josh McRoberts, and Mario Chalmers could all be realistic salary dump candidates should Miami move into that mode, though giving up any of the three would sacrifice depth on an already shallow roster.

It might be hard for Wade to swallow accepting a deal that would send him even further down the salary totem pole below Dragic, $118 million man Bosh and, potentially, Whiteside. But if he bristles and waits, he could find himself with dwindling options in a market that could already be cool for a 33-year-old player whose surgically repaired legs have been a source of concern for the past several seasons.

The Dragic signing gives Riley a chance to make what figures to be a competitive offer that will keep him in Miami for the foreseeable future; it also gives him a primary ball-handling, shot-creating option on which to lean should Wade elect to pursue another opportunity. Judging by how hard he went after Dragic and the vision of the team he constructed, though, you've got to imagine Riley's angling hard for the former and somewhat dreading the latter.

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Dan Devine is an editor for Ball Don't Lie on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at devine@yahoo-inc.com or follow him on Twitter!

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