Doubts and disrespect: Miami Heat, Florida Panthers big dogs again despite making Finals | Opinion

A mere few months ago the Miami Heat in the NBA Finals and Florida Panthers in the Stanley Cup Final played in the championship round of their sport.

Or did they?

You wouldn’t know it as the new seasons get underway. You wouldn’t know it by the 2023-24 betting odds that reflect expectations. There is a paucity of belief that either team will be as good or get as far. Instead the odds suggest broad doubts if not outright disrespect — a consensus feeling that the Heat and Panthers’ long postseason runs were a bit of a fluke and won’t be repeated.

Three months ago, South Florida’s teams teams marked only the 10th time in 77 shared seasons that one sports market had teams playing simultaneously for both the basketball and hockey crowns. No market has yet pulled off the two-title sweep as the Heat and Cats both fell 4-1 in the final round, three wins shy of a championship parade.

They were Cinderellas in sneakers and on skates, the Heat rising from a No. 7 East seed after a regular season only tied for the the 11th best in the league, and the Panthers rising from a No. 8 seed with a season points total that tied for 17th.

Got lucky, say the current betting odds of both.

The long and thoroughly unexpected postseason runs earned little respect. It’s as if each finishing as second best in the sport this past summer earned no goodwill, no belief. It’s as if each is back to that lower-seed expectations.

A survey of eight national betting sportsbooks finds the Panthers placed between ninth and 13th in odds to win the Stanley Cup.

Similarly, the Heat has only the 12th-best odds to win the NBA title and fifth-best in the East, after co-title favorites Boston and Milwaukee, then Philadelphia and even Cleveland. (Miami is tied for seventh in the East, barely a playoff number, in predicted wins at 42.7.)

The perception that drives betting is that the Celtics and Bucks both have appreciably improved while the Heat had a stagnant offseason, essentially standing pat although perhaps even regressing with the departure of Max Strus and Gabe Vincent. Even worse, Milwaukee traded for the star player who was begging to get to Miami in Damian Lillard.

“That remains to be seen,” said Heat coach Erik Spoelstra, of the idea the Celtics and Bucks both got better. “All you want to be coming into a season is a team that can compete for a title. We are one of those teams. You know it when you’re not one. But we are one of those teams. I don’t really care what other people think about it.”

Jimmy Butler ranks 12th and Bam Adebayo 16th in ESPN’s recent ranking of the NBA’s 100 best players. Only three other teams (Bucks, Suns, Lakers) also had two in the top 16. Miami also has a top-tier coach in Spoelstra driving the culture that has the Heat relentlessly competitive, and should again.

In the midst of its preseason schedule, the Heat opens the regular season Oct. 25 at home vs. Detroit.

Butler predicted the Heat will win the championship. Alas, he has little company in that outside of South Florida.

Perhaps alluding to the disrespect being shown his reigning NBA Finals team, “We have guys with chips on their shoulders,” says Spoelstra. ”And that’s a good thing.”

Still, Butler is 34 now, and failing to acquire Lillard and seeing him go to an East archrival stings, and will until which time results this season indicate it should not.

The Panthers face the same doubts: The team that barely made the playoffs, got on a magical run, but now must prove that magic was real, and repeatable. Especially this season, where the top three betting favorites to win it all (Carolina, Toronto and New Jersey) all are in the Eastern Conference.

“At the end of it, it’s just so painful. When you get to the Final, you just believe it’s your year, and then it breaks your heart [to lose],” Florida coach Paul Maurice said this week. “You go through depression. It’s only later that you start to feel it was an incredible year, a special, unique year. Then, that pain, it just fuels you. Our expectations are high.”

Star Matthew Tkachuk and Aleksander Barkov are back to lead. But can Tkachuk equal his fantastic, MVP-worthy last season? Can veteran goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky equal his performance during that feelgood postseason run?

Injuries also weigh on the Panthers, with top defensemen Aaron Ekblad and Brandon Montour out for likely a notable early chunk of the season. The club had four new defenders in the lineup on opening night, a 2-0 loss Thursday in Minnesota. (After three on the road the Cats open at home next Thursday vs. an expected powerhouse in the Maple Leafs.

“We’ve got some challenges with some critical pieces out at the start,” admitted Maurice. “Some physicality has come out of our game.”

The overarching challenge for both the Heat and Panthers is the same, because here s what the betting odds are saying:

Yeah, you played for the championship last season, but we think you got lucky. Do it again.