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Heat's Waiters 'in a great place' despite turbulent start to season

Michael Reaves / Getty Images Sport / Getty

Dion Waiters spoke publicly for the first time on Saturday since the Miami Heat suspended him for 10 games on Nov. 10 for conduct detrimental to the team.

The shooting guard appears to be in good spirits while attempting to move past a turbulent start to his campaign.

"I’m not going to lie to you, I’m in a great place,” Waiters said, according to Syracuse.com's Donna Ditota. “I can only control what I can control at the end of the day, so some things you just can’t allow to take your head the other way, so some things happen for a reason... The only thing I can do is move forward. Stay focused. Stay even-keeled. Let everything else take care of itself.”

Waiters, who's already serving his second suspension this year after being held out of the Heat's regular-season opener for "unprofessional conduct" during the preseason, is setting his sights on contributing to the club upon his return.

"I’m a competitor. Any time you work hard and you envision something a certain way and it’s not going as you planned and you see it, you know, you go back to the drawing board and you figure it out," he said. "... (It’s) being a competitor and wanting to play and me being healthy. Because you set goals. It’s taking a little longer but I still got those same goals, that same ambition. It’s not the end of my story.”

Injuries have prevented Waiters from playing in more than 46 games in any of his three campaigns with the Heat.

Regardless of how healthy he is upon his return, a challenging road to playing time awaits the 27-year-old. He'll likely need to supplant multiple players for a spot in head coach Erik Spoelstra's rotation, including rookie sensations Kendrick Nunn and Tyler Herro.

Waiters is eligible to return following the Heat's game against the Golden State Warriors on Nov. 29. He hasn't appeared in a contest yet this season.

He'll earn a $12.1 million base salary in 2019-20, the third season of his four-year, $52-million contract.

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