Miami Heat post NBA Draft talk from Pat Riley

Offering atypical candor and forthright insight, Miami Heat President Pat Riley early Friday morning clarified several aspects of the team's offseason direction.

Speaking in the wake of Thursday's NBA Draft, Riley touched on issues not previously addressed amid the team's championship celebration.

-- He said the team plans to guarantee the 2012-13 salary of backup center Dexter Pittman by Saturday's deadline.

"He's going to do a lot of work and we're going to give him a great shot," Riley said. "We expected this year that he might be able to really contribute for us.

That could leave as many as three centers under guaranteed contract, including Joel Anthony and possibly Ronny Turiaf, who has a Saturday deadline to invoke his 2012-13 player option in advance of Sunday's start of free agency.

-- He said the team does not plan to use its "amnesty" clause this offseason, which would have enabled the team to avoid a luxury-tax payment with the release of a player under contract.

"We're not looking at amnestying anybody," he said.

Such an approach would bode well for the possibility of a return by Mike Miller, with Riley saying the 3-point specialist would first pursue an aggressive offseason rehabilitation program before considering back surgery.

"He's probably going to spend a couple of weeks just letting everything cool down," Riely said. "He has been examined. There hasn't been any real prognosis from the standpoint of, 'This is what we're going to do.' "

-- He said he has no plans to step down in the wake of his latest championship, as some had speculated.

"I hope it's just the beginning, even for me, in building this team," he said. "I hope this team has a long run.

"My job is to keep adding pieces to it."

-- He said the Heat already has specific players targeted for Sunday's start of free agency, without offering specifics.

"We've got five or six guys earmarked," he said, "so we'll see how it goes."

He also said he would be open to consulting the team's stars about the Heat's free-agency direction.

"We would definitely run names by them," he said.

He indicated he is content with the tandem of Mario Chalmers and Norris Cole at point guard moving forward.

"We feel good with our point guard position," he said, "because we don't need a really, prototypical point guard that needs the ball 80 percent of the time."

He also offered a hint that gives credence to potential Heat pursuit of Celtics free-agent guard Ray Allen, as a complement to LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh.

"We want to find as much space as we can on the floor for Dwyane and for LeBron, for Chris to be able to operate," he said.

He said his staff already is in a back-to-work mode.

"The championship felt great and it still does," he said. "But we're over it, I'm over it. We had a lot of fun for the last week."

-- He warned not to overstate the knee surgery Wade will undergo in just over a week.

"There isn't anybody like him who's played the game for nine years that hasn't had issues," he said.

Riley also spoke of the benefit of the Wade missing the Olympics in light of what he called a quick turnaround to next season, indicating the Heat will open training camp early due to an overseas preseason trip, with the Heat linked to games against the Los Angeles Clippers in China.

-- Riley sidestepped a question about center Eddy Curry possibly returning.

"I think everybody is open to the possibility," he said. "I had good exit meeting with Eddy. He's motivated. It's a shame that he didn't get a chance.

"We're going to talk to Eddy about his summer and about the future, but we'll just have to wait and see."

-- Despite being kept in the dark about it, Riley said he appreciated coach Erik Spoelstra utilizing a facsimile championship trophy for inspiration during the playoffs.

"I'm sort of a thematic guy," he said. "I did ask him, 'Do you have a theme? Do you have a song? Do you have a book?' I thought it was a wonderful idea . . . Now, if it hadn't worked, what do you do with the trophy?"

Follow Ira Winderman at twitter.com/iraheatbeat

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