Wade made right call in coming back to Heat
3-time champion means more to South Florida community than just basketball.
Tom D’Angelo: He wrestled with the decision, but his return is a reminder that no athlete has meant so much to South Florida.
The struggle for Dwyane Wade was real.
On one hand, the most accomplished athlete in South Florida history saw the uniform. He saw the Miami across his chest. He saw a roster still requiring his leadership, his clutch shots and occasional turn-back-theclock performances to steer it towards the playoffs. He saw those magical nights during the final 2½ months last season — the back-to-back games against the 76ers and Lakers and the two vintage performances in the Heat’s short-lived stay in the NBA playoffs.
But Wade also was being pulled another way. To the side that says he will be 37 before the All-Star break. The side that will show he missed nearly two weeks after rejoining the Heat in early February because of a hamstring injury. The side that means, for the 16th straight year, 41 regular-season road games, late-night departures and early morning arrivals, bumps and bruises and muscles that ache every morning, and more time away from his family.
But the selfish side of me says Wade made the right decision to return for one more year, even if it took him all but one week of the offseason to
come to that decision. That is because no other athlete has meant more to this community. Ever. Not when it comes to his extraordinary talent (a 12-time AllStar), combined with winning three championships and making a difference in the community.
Dwyane Wade deserves a sendoff this season like no other athlete ever deserved in South Florida.
Wade stepped out of the darkness Sunday afternoon, looked into the camera and took a big sigh. Wearing a black T-shirt with yellow lettering that read #SPOTLIGHTON and a gold chain, he talked about how difficult it has been to wrestle with this decision.
Does he walk away from a game he has played for 31 years? Can he deal with every step hurting in the morning? Can he deal with the travel? Can he be away from his family?
We all know the answer now, but for Wade, this truly was an internal struggle. Wade is not the player he once was. He admitted he can’t do the extraordinary things he used to do on a basketball court. But Wade’s contribution to the organization and the community in the seven months since he returned made us all realize just how much he was missed during the year and a half he was gone.
Did Wade make a big difference last season? Absolutely. But more so in ways you may not be thinking.
Wade put his stamp on a handful of games during the regular season. And Wade’s inspiring Game 2 of the playoffs in which he scored 28 points, grabbed seven rebounds and made 11-of-16 shots was the difference between the Heat going out in five games and getting swept.
Intangibly, Wade always makes a difference, too, as he has ever since he joined this organization in 2003 as a fresh-faced kid out of Chicago – by way of Marquette University – with a reckless style that would soon endear himself to an entire region. Wade’s current teammates were in awe at first, some too much so, before the excitement diminished and he settled back into the role he held when he left following the 2015-16 season as a mentor to players such as Josh Richardson, Justise Winslow and Tyler Johnson.
But Wade’s contribution to this community transcended basketball. Wade became a beacon for the students of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School after 14 students and three faculty members were killed at their school, a shooting that occurred six days after Wade was reacquired by Miami from Cleveland. One of the dead – Joaquin Oliver – was such a Heat fan that he was buried in Wade’s jersey.
Wade was one of the students’ strongest advocates. He and his wife, Gabrielle Union, donated their time and money to several causes surrounding the shooting.
One day late last season I stood alone with Wade in the hallway outside the Heat locker room and asked him if he believed he was brought back to Miami for reasons that none of us could have ever foreseen.
“It definitely crossed my mind,” he said.
Wade got emotional during the 10-minute message he posted Sunday night to announce his return. Emotional when talking about where he came from. Emotional when talking about the fans — “Wade County! I have a county.” And especially emotional when remembering his longtime agent, Henry Thomas, who passed away in January. “With him not being here last year, that was it, I lost something from this game.”
Calling this the hardest decision he ever had to make, Wade pointed to the camera and said: “I feel it’s right to ask you guys to join me for one last dance, for one last season.”
The ending will not be storybook in the traditional sense. The Miami Heat are not winning a title in Dwyane Wade’s final season. Heck, they may not even win a playoff series.
But this is what everybody wanted to hear. No matter what happens, having Wade walk off the court knowing it’s the last time is the way this story should end.