Pat Riley has done nothing short of embarrass himself in recent days with his comments about how he prefers to build a contender.

“It’s always been my philosophy here that I’m going to build this team through trades and free agency, not the draft,” he said.

This was presumably said in large part to deflect listeners away from his abysmal draft record, a topic I’ve touched on several times in past posts. I’ll get to this questionable statement again at some other time, but for now I want to focus on his addendum.

“I like the homegrown product, I just do,” he said in explaining why he has never put much stock in drafting foreign players. “I feel comfortable with it. And maybe somewhere in free agency or via some trades, we may have missed somewhere along the line, but I just felt I just like the players here.”

Missed someone? Dirk Nowitski, Paul Gasol, Manu Ginobli, Tony Parker, and on… Not all of them were available to be drafted by the Heat, but to categorically eliminate the possibility is ridiculous. Marc Gasol was drafted 48^th overall in the second round of the 2007 NBA Draft.

What Riley fails to recognize here is the quality of international coaching. One such man, who has taught and trained several of today’s international NBA all stars, is Vaclav Peepic.

Take a look at the man behind the men…

This has absolutely nothing to do with Miami Heat basketball. But it makes even me smile. And to top it all off, the Super Bowl was played in Miami…

If you care to know, it’s a picture of holder Pat McAfee and kicker Matt Stover embracing after a first quarter field goal, as Randall Gay walks by in the background.