Four burning NBA questions with playoffs one month away: Can the Heat make a Finals run? WPXI [Video]

The long grind of the regular season is coming to an end, with another, more urgent, grind on the horizon. Here are a few burning questions with the NBA a month away from the start of the playoffs.

The officiating has gotten lighter, fouls are down and scores are off its blistering pace. Does this favor some teams more than others?

For sure it does. The New York Knicks, for one. They bludgeon teams regardless of the rules. But an intriguing squad to monitor is the Miami Heat. They already do a lot of defending without fouling, and because they’re not the biggest team, they’re used to playing with their hands more, doing a little more bumping on the cutters and underneath the basket. And they seem to like it — as they should.

“The last couple games, they’re really letting us play,” Heat center Bam Adebayo told Yahoo Sports …