Wade, O’Neal able to relate to Brady’s situation

MIAMI — Nearly a month removed from his final closure with Pat Riley over his brief divorce from the Miami Heat in 2016, Dwyane Wade spoke on a special edition of the NBA on TNT about the parallels to Tom Brady’s departure from the New England Patriots.

Weeks after he and Riley spoke publicly about their regrets over the ugly turn in 2016 free agency that had Wade away from the Heat for 1 1⁄2 seasons, Wade was asked on a special YouTube version of his TNT studio show to reflect on Brady’s NFL free-agency departure last week from the Patriots to the

Tampa Bay Buccaneers.

To Wade, it brought back memories of his departure from the Heat before returning for the final 1 1⁄2 seasons of his career and then last month’s retirement of his No. 3 jersey at AmericanAirlines Arena.

“One of the toughest things for both an athlete and an organization is the aging superstar, right?” he said on a web version of his weekly studio appearance, with the NBA shutdown due to the coronavirus pandemic.

“When you’ve got somebody who’s been so great for not only the team but also the community, one of the toughest things is what you do when that aging superstar doesn’t want to move on and when you’re ready to kind of get to that next phase. I’m just giving information about that because I was in that same situation, I felt.”

For Wade, it was a case of the Heat first prioritizing re-signing center Hassan Whiteside at the start of 2016 NBA free agency and then reserving salary-cap space for what ultimately proved to be an unsuccessful run at Kevin Durant. That led to Wade spending one season with his hometown Chicago Bulls and then starting the following season alongside friend and former fellow Heat NBA champion LeBron James with the Cleveland Cavaliers before

reuniting with the Heat in February 2018.

While not nearly a Heat icon like Wade, who spent 14 1⁄2 seasons in South Florida, former Heat center Shaquille O’Neal, also a TNT analyst, related the situation with Brady, 42, to when he signed his five-year, $100 million extension with the Heat in the 2005 offseason, a deal well shy of a maximum contract.

The Heat instead were able to utilize their resources that same offseason to trade for Antoine Walker, James Posey and Jason Williams, as well as sign Jason Kapono and Gary Payton.

O’Neal, 33 when he re-upped with the Heat, took nearly an $8 million pay cut in the first year of his revised Heat contract.

“When I was getting my deal redone with Miami, and Pat’s so smooth, he said, ‘Shaq, I love you. You deserve it. I can give you all the money you want, but we ain’t going to win. Or Shaq, I can give you less money and we can bring in Antoine, Posey, GP, Jason Kapono, all of those guys, and we could possibly win a championship,’ ” O’Neal said on the split-screen broadcast, as Wade looked on.

“So at that point I have to say, you know what? Money don’t win it. And I decided to take less money. And we were able to win with the fabulous player and my good friend D-Wade, when we were down two games to Dallas and D-Wade showed up and we beat Dallas four straight games. And they thought they were going to whoop us, ain’t that right, Mark Cuban?”