CHICAGO -- On a day the NBA shook from the aftershocks of LeBron's Decision, the Chicago Bulls and Derrick Rose made their own impact known.
While much of the league used Thursday's trade deadline to prepare for the playoffs, Chicago used a 93-89 win over the Heat to send a simple message: Even without a headline-grabbing trade, they too stand in the way of the Heat's championship designs.
And the Heat sent a message of their own: They're not nearly as improved since those dark November days as they'd like everyone to believe.
"We've got to get more production," Dwyane Wade said afterward from a sober and somber locker room. "We've got to be a whole team and everything. All three of us are not going to play great every night. We've got to make sure the bench doesn't get outscored by 20 points."
There was that problem.
And Chris Bosh, in shooting a stunningly embarrassing and historically bad 1 of 18 from the field, looking again like an out-of-place, frightened rookie.
And LeBron James' God-awful three-point shot -- a shot that could have tied the score with time running out -- that screamed, "Still not clutch."
And a younger Bulls team playing with more guts, moxie and nerve -- more like veterans -- than the Big Three.
Yes, the festering truths evident in yet another game in which the Heat could not close out the fourth quarter against an elite opponent run deeper than just the bench.
Between the Heat offering more proof they're still outmatched against elite teams and the trade deadline coming and going, Thursday was about two things: The NBA realigning itself around a post-Decision world, and the Miami Heat standing pat despite too many signs the Big Three are far from enough.
LeBron James is the reason Carmelo Anthony is now a New York Knick. Why Deron Williams is a New Jersey Net. Why Kendrick Perkins will be donning a Thunder jersey the rest of the season while Jeff Green will wear Celtic green.
"It felt like there's an incredible arms race in the entire league going down to the trade deadline," Miami head coach Erik Spoelstra said before the game. "And that's what happens. The competition brings out competition and competitive spirits in people. What we did this summer . . . other teams are trying to build up, and we feel good about what we have right now."
Maybe they shouldn't.
The Heat are now 0-5 against Chicago and Boston, their two toughest rivals in the Eastern Conference. In the West, they're 0-2 against the Dallas Mavericks, another team flirting with being championship-caliber, and they've yet to play the San Antonio Spurs, who sport the league's best record. They're a pedestrian 12-14 against teams with a .500 or better record.
While the rest of the league responded to the Heat's summer, the Heat failed to respond to what's transpired since October. Because as much as the Big Three have redefined what it means to court talent and sign stars, they've also shown you can't win without help from other places on the roster.
Not when one of your max players is Chris Bosh.
Chicago got Joakim Noah back this week. The Thunder got bigger, stronger and tougher defensively. Boston made a bold trade, regardless of whether Green turns out to be the missing ingredient or a game-ending Jenga piece.
The Heat? Their biggest move was to announce Erick Dampier is their starting center.
Either Pat Riley has his Big Three and Co. pegged as playoff performers based on evidence not yet entered into the record, or he was handcuffed in the moves he knows he needed to make. Or perhaps he drank too much from the same Big Three Kool-Aid the rest of the league tasted before that rough November showed the flaws of teaming up LeBron, Wade and Bosh.
Time will tell which.
Starting with Thursday's loss, the Heat's truest testing ground of the season stretches into a March in which they'll play a collection of playoff-bound and contending teams: Los Angeles, San Antonio, Oklahoma City, New York, Atlanta and Chicago again. It'll be a series of challenges on a scale they've yet to see so far this season.
The Heat are good. Sometimes very good. But great? Thursday was another reminder they're not that, not yet.
Thursday was a reminder that the Chicago Bulls are a team to fear in May. A reminder that the Miami Heat are in many ways that same humbled and humiliated team from November.
They still do not have the ability to adequately guard an elite point guard. LeBron took on those duties Thursday against Rose, the league's likely MVP, possibly costing himself much-needed energy for the offensive tests to come in the fourth quarter. In crunch time, one MVP candidate against another, Rose was able to get the ball to Luol Deng in the corner for what was a game-deciding three-point basket.
The Heat still don't have a point guard of their own who anyone else has to worry about guarding. Mario Chalmers is certainly not the answer, not even as he's played better than awful the past two weeks. And Carlos Arroyo rarely plays anymore.
The Heat still have the Bosh who inspired the parody "Like-A-Bosh," a max player who in big games either disappears (usually) or hits an assortment of jump shots on the way to a less-than-impactful, but statistically impressive game (much less often). He was 1 of 18 on Thursday, a Heat record for futility.
One. Of. Eighteen.
Not the guy a team turns to in crunch time, ever.
The Heat still don't know who will take the last shot. On Thursday, it was LeBron. Based on how off that shot was, it probably should have been Wade. Wade alone has shown himself able to handle the weight of what the Big Three hoisted on their team's shoulders.
The Heat still lack the inside presence to battle even mediocre frontcourts. Against Chicago, they were out-rebounded 53-39, a stat that should jump off the page and slap any Heat fan in the face.
On the list goes.
Whether Boston erred in sacrificing Perkins' inside toughness, whether 'Melo can make the Knicks a legitimate playoff team and whether Perkins hoists Oklahoma City to championship-caliber status, the Bulls stood with what they had and showed they can beat Miami in a seven-game series.
Unable to land the right two-guard, they allowed Noah's return to be their midseason addition. That move looked like enough Thursday night.
And the Heat?
They stuck with Dampier, the Big Three, a bench that scored two points Thursday and the hope that they'll eventually live up to the hype against more than mediocre teams.
So far, that recipe has the score looking like this: Boston 3, Chicago 2, Miami 0.
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