There's no denying that Miami Heat stud Tyler Herro has been one of the biggest revelations early in the season. Herro has been absolutely balling for the Heat to start the campaign and as a matter of fact, his performances have propelled him as an early contender for this season's Sixth Man of the Year award.
Despite his strong play, however, Charles Barkley isn't ready to jump on the Tyler Herro hype train just yet. Chuck is admittedly a big fan of the Heat youngster, but at this point, the Hall of Famer doesn't believe that Herro is at an elite level just yet.
Herro himself recently made a rather audacious claim about being at the same level as Luka Doncic, Trae Young, and Ja Morant. In his mind, the Heat shooting guard believes that he should be in the same boat as the aforementioned stars:
“I feel like I’m in the same conversation as those guys, the young guys coming up in the league who can be All-Stars, superstars one day,” Herro said. “Luka [Doncic], Trae [Young], Ja [Morant], those guys like that. I feel like my name should be in that category too.”
People are opinionated when it comes to Tyler Herro’s future and how he projects, so I asked him where he sees himself in the mix
He told me he should be grouped with the likes of Luka Doncic, Trae Young, and Ja Morant as possible future stars
Listen 👇 pic.twitter.com/fQjM2fWEAN
— jeremy taché (@jeremytache) October 12, 2021
Quite a bold statement from Herro here, wouldn't you say? Well, for his part, Charles Barkley refused to get on board with Herro's claim, and he just had to speak his mind about it:
“I’m a big Tyler Herro fan, but just because they got the same numbers, those guys have to carry a team every night, and first of all, second issue is he’s playing against backups,” Barkley siad, via Sam Leweck of Heat Nation. “When you’re coming off the bench, you’re playing against backups. So, no disrespect, Herro’s a nice little player, but when you are the man, first and foremost, and also, the pressure with going to be the man is not telling anybody, ‘Hey, Tyler, come off the bench, shoot it anytime you want to. You’re playing against scrubs on the second unit.'”
Charles Barkley disagrees with Tyler Herro being in same conversation at Luka and Trae pic.twitter.com/ZBsshoP5Ta
— Brendan Tobin (@Brendan_Tobin) November 3, 2021
Once again, Barkley raises an excellent point here. Tyler Herro is averaging a very impressive 22.4 points per game for the Heat this season, and he's doing this while coming off the bench. For Barkley, however, this is exactly why he believes Herro is not at the same level as the Luka's, the Trae's, and the Ja's of the NBA. The fact that Herro is part of Miami's second unit means that for the most part, he faces off against the non-stars of opposing teams. There's a big difference between going up against the best players in the league as compared to battling it out against the opposition's second unit.
As for Shaq, however, he unsurprisingly had a contradictory view about Tyler Herro. Shaq already said in the past that he believes Herro should be in the same conversation as Luka and Trae, and he doubled down on his belief here. O'Neal is clearly high on the Heat stud, and as usual, he and Barkley are not on the same wavelength on this one yet again.
For what it's worth, Herro has amassed 157 points through Miami's first seven games of the season. That's the most points scored in the NBA this season for a player coming off the bench by quite a margin. After a rather disappointing sophomore campaign last year, there's no denying now that Herro is in the midst of a resurgence. Whether or not he's a superstar-caliber player, however, still remains highly debatable, to say the least.
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