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Just when the Miami Heat appeared to be playing their best basketball of the season, they managed to drop a dud against the sub-par Milwaukee Bucks.
The Heat's throwback Miami Floridian jerseys didn't faze the upset-minded Bucks, who finished the game on a 7-0 run to put an end to the Heat's three-game winning streak.
How did the Bucks stop the psychedelic Floridians? They did so by capitalizing off a ridiculous 22 Heat turnovers, which is almost seven more than their 15.2 season average.
The Bucks scored 22 points off Heat turnovers, which ultimately proved to be the real difference maker in the game.
The most shocking part of the Heat's 22-turnover performance on Sunday night was that the turnovers weren't a result of some brilliant defensive scheme drawn up by Bucks head coach Scott Skiles, or by Milwaukee overpowering the Heat on the defensive side of the ball.
The Heat's turnover explosion against the Bucks came about because they played apathetically, uninspired and ridiculously lazily.
Coming off a three-game stretch against teams with a combined record of 31-20, the Heat were perfectly set up for a letdown and that's exactly what Sunday night turned out to be in South Beach.
The Bucks managed to hold the Heat to a season worst 37.4 field-goal percentage, but what is more amazing is that Milwaukee managed to do the Heat one better by beating them with an even worse field-goal percentage of just 35.0 percent.
That's not a sign of the Heat losing to a better team, that's a sign of the Heat letting a worse team beat them, and that's not really a reason to be concerned in South Beach.
What the Heat need to be worried about is their tendency to play down to the competition they face, rather than bringing their dominant style of game to their opponent, night in and night out.
What's going to keep the Miami Heat from having the best overall record in the NBA and even the Eastern Conference at the end of the season isn't the talent on their roster or their championship potential, it's the Heat's tendency to become complacent throughout the season against weaker competition.
Look at it this way.
Whenever a team takes the court against the Heat, they have a chance to take down the mighty "Big Three" of the Miami Heatles.
When the Heat take the court against a team that's not from Chicago, Boston, New York, Atlanta, Orlando, Los Angeles, Oklahoma City or Dallas, they face a matchup that's just another game they're supposed to easily win.
That dichotomy is the reason why the Heat will continue to lose to teams that they shouldn't throughout the continuation of the 2011-12 season.
There's no doubt that the Heat are one of the best teams in the NBA, and even if they lose to teams like Milwaukee throughout the rest of the regular season, those losses won't prove anything more than the Heat having trouble hyping themselves up to play sub-par teams night in and night out.
So does a loss to a 6-9 Milwaukee Bucks team teach us anything about the Miami Heat that we didn't already know? No, not really.
Sunday night's loss taught us one thing, that the Heat aren't invincible in their awesome throwback Floridian jerseys, which is a shame, because they are absolutely epic.
Next up? A Jan. 24th visit from LeBron's old team, the Cleveland Cavaliers, who are off to a slightly impressive 6-9 start..
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