"Birdman" suspended tonight, and without their mid-season pick-up, Chris Andersen, the Miami Heat will have a tough time closing out their series against the Indiana Pacers in Indiana tonight.

Many prognosticators thought this might happen, but after Chris Andersen was awarded a Flagrant Foul for his off-the-ball hit on Pacers forward, Tyler "Psycho T" Hansborough, in game 4, the NBA upgraded it to a Flagrant 2 foul, which means he'll be out tonight.

On the play in question, with only a couple minutes having elapsed during the second quarter of game 4 on Thursday night, the camera panned over to the action on the floor and almost completely missed Birdman level Hansborough to the ground.

The shove by Birdman seemed to come out of nowhere, but as TNT's Shaquille O'Neal pointed out at halftime, Paul George had shoved Andersen during the earlier rebound and Andersen mistakenly thought it had been Hansborough. See it in the video below:

As you can see from this gif by SB Nation, Andersen appeared to hit Hansborough from the blind side, which the NBA does not approve.

But why should the loss of the Heat's second string center be such a big deal?

The Birdman's suspension means they won't have one of their few low post players that can matchup against the Pacers' Roy Hibbert.

The 7'2" Hibbert has been killing the Heat on the offensive glass, and despite outweighing Andersen substantially, the Birdman's size is something the Heat really need for this Eastern Conference Finals.

That's not all though. The Birdman suspension means they're also missing a player who hasn't missed a shot since May 13 against Chicago in the Eastern Conference Semifinals. 

The Birdman is 17-for-17 from the field in that stretch and even though most of his shots come at the rim on putbacks or dunks after LeBron collapses Indiana's defense, they'll stil miss that perfect offense down by the basket. 

Whether the Heat can close out the Eastern Conference Finals tonight remains a mystery, but the absence of the Birdman, Chris Andersen, makes their chances a lot harder, despite his place as a rotation player coming off the bench.