Updates on Herro and Dragic, and options for the Heat’s newest salary cap exception

A six-pack of Miami Heat notes on a Tuesday:

▪ The Heat’s depleted backcourt might get reinforcements when the team returns from a seven-game road trip to play Toronto on Wednesday.

Guard Goran Dragic (left ankle sprain) has been upgraded from out to questionable. Guard Tyler Herro (right hip contusion) and power forward Chris Silva (left hip flexor strain) also are questionable. Guard Avery Bradley (right calf strain) remains out.

Dragic has missed nine consecutive games since spraining his ankle Feb. 5 against Washington.

Herro sustained the hip injury during Saturday’s game against the Lakers and missed Monday’s win at Oklahoma City, the ninth game he has missed this season.

Bradley has missed 10 games in a row and last appeared in a game Feb. 3. At the time of the injury, doctors told him he could return in three to four weeks, which would be some time in the next week barring a setback or slow recovery.

Before the calf injury, Bradley missed eight games after contracting COVID-19 and two games with a right knee contusion. He has appeared in only 10 of the Heat’s first 31 games, starting one of them.

▪ The Heat on Tuesday was awarded a $4.7 million disabled-player exception in the wake of losing Meyers Leonard to a season-ending shoulder injury; that comes with an April 19 deadline.

Miami still has a $7.5 million trade exception, which expires on March 22. And the Heat has a $3.6 million biannual exception.

But those exceptions cannot be combined to allow the Heat to acquire a player earning $16 million.

Any player acquired must not exceed the value of those exceptions.

The disabled-player exception can be used on a player who was released or via trade to acquire a player in the final year of his contract. The trade exception can be used in a trade for any player earning $7.5 million or less this season. The biannual exception — which Miami is unlikely to use this season — can be used on a free agent.

The Heat stands about $8 million below the luxury tax threshold, making it realistic for the Heat to use the disabled-player exception or the trade exception but not both — unless Miami sheds salary as part of a trade.

And the Heat would need to trade or release a player to create the roster room to sign a player with any of those three exceptions.

So far, there has been only one prominent veteran who has been released for the purpose of allowing him to sign with a contender: Center DeMarcus Cousins, who will clear waivers at 5 p.m. Thursday.

Cleveland’s Andre Drummond and Detroit’s Blake Griffin are sitting out games while their teams mull whether to release them or trade them (unlikely in Griffin’s case).

The Heat has been interested in Cousins over the years, and Cousins likes the Heat and has a good relationship with Jimmy Butler. He’s an option with Miami’s disabled-player exception.

But it also won’t be surprising if Cousins opts for an opportunity elsewhere, perhaps Boston or Dallas or Brooklyn, which can offer a $5.7 million disabled-player exception but is well above the luxury tax line.

(The Lakers aren’t interested in bringing Cousins back to their organization, The Los Angeles Times reported Tuesday.)

And keep this in mind, too: Even though Cousins is a serviceable three-point shooter (33.2 percent in his career, 33.6 this season), he isn’t the prototypical stretch big that Erik Spoelstra likes to play alongside Bam Adebayo.

So unless Spoelstra changes his approach — or Cousins is encouraged to shoot more threes here — he likely wouldn’t command major minutes alongside Adebayo, thus making Miami potentially less attractive as an option.

Cousins is averaging 7.6 rebounds in 20.2 minutes per game, compared with Heat starting power forward Kelly Olynyk’s 5.7 rebounds in 26 minutes per game.

Olynyk is shooting a career-low 33 percent on three pointers but has 59 threes this season, compared with Cousins’ 39.

Interestingly, the Heat is 8-1 this season when Olynyk scores at least 15 points.

Cousins is averaging 9.6 points; Olynyk is averaging 10.1 points while playing six minutes more per game.

▪ Beyond Cousins, an update on some potentially available power rotation players worth monitoring before the March 25 trade deadline, with all four of these players in the final year of their contracts:

Houston’s P.J. Tucker is averaging a career-low 4.5 points and 4.5 rebounds in 29.7 minutes per game and shooting just 32 percent on threes. ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski said the Rockets want a player, not a draft pick, for him, and that the Heat, Lakers and Bucks are among those who have expressed interest.

Players are shooting 49.6 percent against Tucker, though he’s traditionally a good defender. Tucker is earning $7.9 million, so he would not fit into the trade exception or disabled-player exception....

San Antonio’s Rudy Gay is averaging 11.2 points and 5.2 rebounds and shooting 36.6 percent on threes. Players he’s guarding are shooting just 42.8 percent against him. He’s earning $14.5 million, meaning the Heat could not use the trade exception or disabled-player exception to acquire him…

Sacramento’s Nemanja Bjelica, since coming out of mothballs recently, is averaging 16.3 points and 7.0 rebounds in the three games in which he has played more than 12 minutes, shooting 20 for 37 in those games.

Players are shooting 46.6 percent against him overall this season. He’s earning $7.2 million, meaning the Heat could use the trade exception to acquire him....

Atlanta’s John Collins, who seems an unlikely Heat option because the Hawks reportedly want a high lottery pick as part of a package for him, is averaging 17.6 points and 7.5 rebounds and shooting 37.9 percent on threes.

Players are shooting 48.9 percent against him. Though Collins is earning just $4.1 million in the final year of his rookie deal, any Heat package would require considerable assets, making it unlikely he would be acquired through either the disabled-player exception or trade exception.

The power rotation players, besides Cousins, who potentially could be acquired with Miami’s $4.7 million disabled-player exception: Drummond, only if the Cavs cut him; Griffin, only if the Pistons cut him; and Cleveland center JaVale McGee, who’s earning $4.2 million and likely would be an option for Miami only if a Heat center/power forward is sidelined for awhile with an injury.

▪ Kendrick Nunn’s resurgence ranks among the best developments of this Heat season.

His averages over his past four games: 38.3 minutes, 20.5 points, 4.0 assists, 3.5 rebounds, 1.5 steals, 0.8 turnovers per game, 50 percent shooting from the field and 53.1 on threes and 5 for 5 on free throws.

One key in his growth has been better overall efficiency on different parts of the floor: Overall this season, he’s shooting 11 for 17 (64.7 percent) from 16 feet to the three-point line (compared to 46.2 percent last season) and 37.9 percent on threes (compared with 35.0 last season).

And there’s this nugget, from Fox Sports Sun: Since 2000, only Nunn, Steph Curry and Kevin Durant have achieved these thresholds over 16 consecutive games (an ongoing streak for Nunn): 17.7 points, 3.9 rebounds, 2.8 assists on 49.8 percent shooting, 40.2 percent on threes and 87 percent on free throws.

▪ The hope is that Duncan Robinson’s exceptional fourth quarter Monday against the Thunder (13 points, 3 for 6 on threes) can help him get back to his fourth-quarter efficiency levels of last season.

During the 2019-20 regular season, Robinson shot 42.3 percent on fourth-quarter three pointers (55 for 130). Among all NBA players who took a minimum of 100 three-pointers in the fourth quarter, only Doug McDermott and Kemba Walker shot them at a higher rate.

This season, Robinson is shooting 32.7 percent on fourth-quarter threes (18 for 55). That’s 34th in the league among players who have attempted at least 40 fourth-quarter threes.

One constant is Robinson’s fourth-quarter free-throw shooting: 12 for 13 last season and a remarkable 25 for 25 this season.

▪ Quick stuff: We hear Miami-Dade County is seeking at least $8 million for a corporate naming rights sponsor for the Heat’s arena. AmericanAirlines continues to have its name on the arena even though its deal ended more than a year ago…

Justise Winslow has 12 points and 10 rebounds but shot just 4 for 24 this week in his first two NBA games for the Memphis Grizzlies since the Heat traded him last February. Winslow has been injured for much of the past year...

Among all Heat rotation players, Jimmy Butler has the best defensive field-goal percentage against (39.9)...Olynyk is the worst at 49.7. If you wondered, Cousins is allowing players he guards to shoot 48.3 percent. He has lost some mobility after assorted injuries.

Here’s my Tuesday Marlins 6-pack, with some personnel news and important news for fans who like to watch the team on TV.

Here’s my Tuesday Dolphins piece on their interest in a Pro Bowl running back.