Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
A return for Wade? Now’s not the time
If I were Pat Riley, I wouldn’t sign Dwyane Wade this offseason. Wade is the biggest winner ever in South Florida. His bond is forever. But no matter how tempting, no matter how much eye contact is made across the room, I don’t bring Wade back this soon.
In other words, I’d deal with Wade in the same manner as the Heat are with Chris Bosh, in what are surely his final hours on the roster.
The stories, exits and legacies are different with Wade and Bosh. But the working philosophy about each right now links them to how the biggest of The Big Three, LeBron James, dumped the Heat for Cleveland in a way that’s worked out just fine for him.
This is business. Cold, calculated, clumsy and, at times like this, uncomfortably selfish business.
Rome didn’t crumble in a day, and neither has this one-time Heat dynasty. But the final piece is going now, with Bosh’s imminent release. Unfortunately, blood clots ended Bosh’s Heat time and, most likely, his basketball career.
That doesn’t explain why the Heat have waited this long to release him. That’s because they needed Wednesday’s deadline to pass for players to be put on playoff rosters. That guarantees Bosh couldn’t play 25 games for anyone this year.
That’s necessary for the Heat to get his hefty salary-cap space for spending this summer. So it’s business being conducted in a clunky but understandable manner as demanded by NBA rules.
The Heat moved on this year from Bosh, just as they did with Wade, who keeps drop-
ping bread crumbs that he’d be open to leaving Chicago. He caused another local stir this week by again talking about his option to leave this summer, as his contract allows.
“I take my option seriously, and I always look into what’s the best thing for me to do,” he told ESPN. “I haven’t talked to [Bulls management] about that. I don’t want to. I don’t want them to come to me and tell me what moves they’re making, what their future plans [are].
“I just want to play basketball. And do my best job as a player that I can do. Then from there, let them look at me and my talent and what I did, and let me look where the team’s at and on what I did this season and go from there.”
It’s been a bumpy ride for Wade in Chicago. Does anyone doubt if he could do it again he’d take the Heat’s two-year, $42 million offer and stay?
That moment is gone. The blueprint has changed. Bringing back Wade, at 36 next year, for a season or two would be a nice publicrelations gesture. Surely, it would be a feel-good moment for Heat President Pat Riley to soothe any frayed feelings.
But would it help winning? Goran Dragic has assumed a winning role without Wade. Dion Waiters, at 25, is playing the past couple of months like the fourth overall pick he once was.
If you invest in Wade, you can’t in Waiters or someone else at the shooting guard spot this summer. That’s not to say there won’t be a time for Wade to come back. There was for another Heat lifer who left on bad terms.
Alonzo Mourning returned as a role player to help the Heat to the 2006 title. That might be the time to bring back Wade, if the planets line up for such a move. He’s not there now. He can still start for decent teams.
Maybe this is all irrelevant. Maybe Chicago assembles a good run in the spring and Wade decides to stay there. Or maybe it falls apart and he considers reuniting with LeBron in Cleveland or wants to flirt with the Heat.
It’s tempting. Many fans would love the headline. Riley might like ending last summer’s ugliness in a hug. But Riley is about titles, not headlines. It might be right to bring Wade back someday. It’s just not now.