Tyler Herro is central to Heat-Sixers, and Miami's title hopes

Tyler Herro received his Sixth Man of the Year award Wednesday night ahead of Game 2 of the Eastern Conference semifinal between his Miami Heat and the Philadelphia 76ers. Shortly after that, about seven minutes into the first quarter, he came off the bench and showcased all of the skill and bravado that have made him the NBA's most valuable reserve.

For a second straight game, Herro diced up Philly's undermanned defense and kept Miami's occasionally sludgy half-court offense out of the mud. He rained jumpers, snaked his way to the rim, and guided his big men into layups and dunks with canny pick-and-roll passing. The 22-year-old mostly managed to stay out of compromising defensive situations and even made a few disruptive plays on the perimeter. He snagged eight rebounds for good measure.

Herro is something of a bellwether for the Heat. Their middling half-court offense badly needs his shotmaking and off-the-dribble creation, especially with Kyle Lowry sidelined. He's by far the team's most dangerous pull-up shooter and perhaps the only one who can consistently draw two to the ball on the perimeter. Herro's shooting gravity also makes him an effective screener because of how reluctant his man is to leave him. His screens for Jimmy Butler - both on and off the ball - are also an important component of Miami's offense:

When Philly has gone zone to junk up the Heat's offensive rhythm, Herro's unconscious outside shooting has often broken it. (He's 7-for-11 from 3-point range in the series, while the rest of the team is 16-for-54.) When the Sixers have been dialed in and connected with their switching, Herro gave the Heat the one-on-one juice they needed. And his two-man game with Bam Adebayo has been the team's comfort food, shredding the Sixers' (admittedly lackluster) pick-and-roll defense in a variety of ways.

When his defender dared to duck under screens in Game 1, Herro casually drained pull-up threes. Against Philly's drop coverage, he used probe dribbles to get to mid-range step-backs or open up the pocket pass. Herro hit Adebayo rolling into an empty side when the Sixers started bringing their bigs higher up in ball-screen coverage. And when they made a point of playing all the way up to the level against him in Game 2, he started rejecting the screen and gliding into the middle of the floor:

That said, Herro struggled a bit when Philly started all-out blitzing him late in the game. He needs to get better at handling pressure and getting off the ball early against traps.

However, the far bigger concern is that Herro is the weakest defender in Miami's rotation with below-average strength and one of the league's shortest wingspans. The Heat are pretty ironclad elsewhere, so he's the rare soft spot opposing offenses can consistently pick on.

Scheming around defensive liabilities is nothing new for Erik Spoelstra and Co. If anything, this Miami team has better two-way balance than the one that went to the Finals two years ago when Spoelstra had to find creative ways to cover for Herro and Duncan Robinson. The acquisition and development of a cadre of role players who can credibly shoot and defend - Max Strus, Gabe Vincent, Caleb Martin, and a rejuvenated Victor Oladipo - has rendered Robinson superfluous. (He's barely played outside of garbage time since going 8-for-9 from deep in Miami's postseason opener.)

But until we see a larger sample of quality play from Oladipo, it's safe to say none of those guys bring anything resembling Herro's on-ball dynamism. That's why the Heat must shield him as best they can at the defensive end. They need him on the floor to grease the wheels of their offense. And that makes Herro central to basically everything going on at both ends of the court for almost every minute he's out there.

Joel Embiid's absence has magnified the target on Herro's back in the series against Philly. With their entire post offense shelved and their bread-and-butter 1-5 pick-and-roll game rendered useless, the Sixers have no recourse but to go after Herro with small-small screening actions. Philly has to either get Herro switched onto one of its three remaining competent scorers - Tyrese Maxey, James Harden, and Tobias Harris - or create a crease it can attack in Miami's scramble to avoid said switch.

While that's borne some fruit for Philly's offense, Herro and the Heat have mostly done a good job of rebuffing those mismatch-hunting efforts. They have a few ways to keep Herro out of unfavorable matchups. When they aren't playing zone and keeping him anchored on one side of the floor, they'll have him show and recover, or they'll concede the switch and immediately bring a double team.

Sometimes the Heat survive those situations:

And sometimes they don't:

In either case, you can see how much effort is required.

It helps that the Sixers have a handful of unthreatening offensive players for Herro to hide on. He's mainly defended Danny Green and Matisse Thybulle in the series, and the Sixers aren't keen to involve either of them in action because neither poses a threat as a playmaker in space. Green is a threat to score out of the pick-and-pop, but Miami has an answer for that. Watch Herro hedge this ball screen and note where his recovery takes him. Hint: Not back to his original assignment:

A lot of teams defend pick-and-pops by bringing a third defender over, but it's typically a stunt rather than a full rotation. The Heat will exchange assignments when possible to give Herro an easier recovery.

Philly will continue to make Herro a focal point if or when Embiid returns. On offense, he'll be relied upon to bust a much more constricting Sixers drop. Miami will need Herro to pull Embiid away from the rim and force the big man to account for him off-ball with his ability to stop and pop off of pindowns and dribble-handoffs. On defense, Philly will keep dragging him into screening actions, not just as a matchup for its guards to attack but as a way to force him to defend pick-and-rolls with Embiid on the other end, negating the viability of switching. (That's essentially what the Sixers did to Gary Trent Jr. and the Raptors in Game 6 of the first round.)

And if the Heat wind up advancing, whichever team they meet in the East finals will be equally honed in on Herro. The Boston Celtics and Milwaukee Bucks have fewer natural hiding places than this version of Philly does. They're also better equipped to both attack Herro one-on-one and exploit the pockets of space that open up when Miami puts two on the ball. Even more than that, the Celtics and Bucks can isolate and expose him as a low man in a way the Embiid-less, pick-and-roll-deficient Sixers can't.

Those teams also might have the two most suffocating interior defenses in the league. The Heat won't survive a series against either of them without a healthy dose of Herro's shotmaking.

All of which is to say: even though he isn't the best or even one of the three best players on his team, and even though he's a mere sixth man, Herro is arguably the player who sits at the crux of Miami's postseason aspirations. He represents their potential offensive salvation ... and their potential defensive downfall.