Heat’s Terry Rozier and Nikola Jovic still working way back, but expect to be ready for camp

With the start of training camp approaching, there’s good news for the Miami Heat.

Heat guard Terry Rozier (neck) and forward Nikola Jovic (foot and ankle) both expect to be ready to take part in training camp after dealing with injuries in recent months. The Heat will hold media day on Sept. 30 at Kaseya Center in Miami before opening training camp at Baha Mar in the Bahamas on Oct. 1.

But Rozier and Jovic are also still working through the latter stages of the recovery process as training camp approaches.

“Where I’m at right now is just about fully, fully, fully cleared to play 5-on-5,” Rozier said during a conference call with local reporters on Wednesday. “But I am doing every on-court activity, playing a little bit of 3-on-3. So I figure in the next couple weeks, I’ll be graduating to 5-on-5. I feel great.”

Jovic said during a conference call Wednesday: “I would say I’m almost fully healthy. Of course, there’s a little ligament that still has to be 100 percent. They told me it would take a little bit more time, but it shouldn’t be an issue. Basically I’m 100 percent.”

Rozier missed the Heat’s final 11 games last season because of his neck injury. After being acquired from the Charlotte Hornets through a trade on Jan. 23, Rozier averaged 16.4 points, 4.2 rebounds, 4.6 assists and one steal per game while shooting 42.3 percent from the field and 37.1 percent on threes in 31 games (30 starts) for the Heat last regular season before being sidelined by the neck issue.

With the injury first listed as neck stiffness, Rozier initially blamed the injury on “the traveling and the sleeping” in early April. But further tests revealed concerning results, as the Heat held Rozier out of the final four games of the regular season, the two play-in tournament games and the entire five-game first-round playoff series against the Boston Celtics with what the team went on to list as neck spasms.

Rozier said to reporters in July that he was already cleared to resume basketball activity, but it has been a slow ramp-up process since then. The hope is that he’ll begin playing 5-on-5 basketball next week just two weeks before training camp.

“I’m a gamer, I’m a hooper,” Rozier said. “I think getting my wind up is the most important thing. But once we all come into camp together, just getting that full camp together is the most important thing. Not me trying to learn how to play five on five again, I’ll be fine. I think it’s just me getting with the other guys and getting on that level so we can play the right way, play together.”

Jovic, who won a bronze medal this summer with Serbia at the Paris Olympics, almost didn’t play in the Olympics because of his injury. He spent much of the Paris Games working his way back to form after sustaining a left ankle and foot injury in June during an offseason workout in Miami.

“I had a little fracture,” Jovic said. “It was not just a normal sprained ankle, it was a little fracture that I had. I did the MRIs and everything, at that point they weren’t sure if I was going to make it in the Olympics. But my biggest goal was to just be there and be with the team and help them as much as I can and play.

“We flew to Paris and I knew I was not in great shape because I hadn’t played in awhile. My foot maybe wasn’t ready for a big role and we knew all that, and coach understands everything. But he still wanted me to go, he still believed I could help as much as I can and that’s what I did.”

Before Jovic’s role shrunk in the knockout rounds of the Olympics, he averaged seven points, 2.3 rebounds and 1.3 assists in 16.7 minutes per game in a reserve role while shooting 43.8 percent from the field and 3 of 10 (30 percent) from three-point range in Serbia’s three group phase games.

Jovic, who is preparing for his third NBA season, closed his second NBA season as the Heat’s starting power forward. He flashed his impressive combination of size and skill at 6-foot-10 and 205 pounds after becoming the Heat’s full-time starting power forward in February, averaging 9.5 points, 4.2 rebounds and 2.1 assists per game on 47.6 percent shooting from the field and 39 percent shooting from three-point range while starting his final 26 appearances of last regular season.

Jovic, who also was used as a starter in each of the Heat’s five playoff games last season, is now battling tendinitis as he continues to move closer to full health.

“We’re making sure that my foot is good after every practice because the injury I had is of course not a joke and we really don’t want any new problems with it,” Jovic said of his offseason work in Miami since the end of the Olympics. “So during training camp, I wouldn’t say I’m going to sit down or anything, but of course you just want to make sure that everything is good. If something starts hurting by any chance, I’ll probably need to step away. But I don’t think that will be the case and I’m really looking forward to being 100 percent and giving everything I have.”

HEAT ADDS TO ROSTER

The Heat added center Malik Williams and guard Bryson Warren to Exhibit 10 contracts, a league source confirmed on Wednesday. The Exhibit 10 deal is essentially an invite to training camp and protects him from being signed away by another team.

Williams, 26, went undrafted out of Louisville in 2022. He spent most of last season with the Heat’s G League affiliate, the Sioux Falls Skyforce, before signing two 10-day contracts with the Toronto Raptors in the final weeks of the regular season.

Williams averaged 11.1 points, 9.3 rebounds, 1.4 assists and 1.2 blocks per game while shooting 43.6 percent from the field and 31 of 97 (32 percent) from three-point range in 33 games (24 starts) for the Skyforce last season.

Warren, 19, also spent time last season with the Heat’s G League affiliate. He averaged 6.9 points, 1.4 rebounds and 1.8 assists per game while shooting 37.6 percent from the field and 38 of 117 (32.5 percent) on threes in 10 games for the Skyforce this past season.

Warren was a member of the Heat’s summer league roster this year, but he played in just three of the Heat’s nine summer league games.

The Exhibit 10 contract will likely result in Williams and Warren spending more time with the Skyforce this upcoming season.

The Heat’s preseason roster is now at the NBA maximum of 21 players.

The 14 players signed by the Heat to standard contracts for next season are Jimmy Butler, Bam Adebayo, Tyler Herro, Rozier, Duncan Robinson, Haywood Highsmith, Kel’el Ware, Kevin Love, Jaquez, Josh Richardson, Nikola Jovic, Thomas Bryant, Alec Burks, and Pelle Larsson.

While the Heat’s standard roster remains one short of the regular-season limit of 15 players, the Heat is expected to open this upcoming regular season with 14 players on standard deals — which is permitted by NBA rules — because of its salary-cap crunch. That’s because unless a trade is made to change the salary cap math, the Heat does not have enough room under the punitive second apron to sign a 15th player to a standard contract.

The Heat’s three two-way contract players are Josh Christopher, Keshad Johnson and Dru Smith.

The Heat also has Isaiah Stevens and Zyon Pullin, who both went undrafted this year, signed to Exhibit 10 contracts.

Pullin, Stevens, Warren and Williams are the players who the Heat currently has signed to Exhibit 10 deals. The Heat has until the day before the start of the regular season to decide whether to move them to a standard/two-way roster spot or waive them.

NBA teams are allowed to carry up to 21 players under contract in the offseason and preseason. Rosters must be cut to a maximum total of 18 players (15 on standard contracts and three on two-way contracts) by the start of the regular season.