If Dwyane Wade Opts Out, Could The Bucks Chase Him?

The NBA is a strange and wonderful place, particularly at this time of year. As the Milwaukee Bucks assess talent in the Draft and amongst the pool of free agents, some of the NBA’s biggest names have decisions of their own to make too. Take Dwyane Wade for example.

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At 33 years of age, Wade has just completed his twelfth season in the NBA. The Chicago native has been an All-Star in eleven of those seasons, been the league’s scoring champion, the Finals MVP, and won three NBA Championships.

All of those accolades he has picked up have come as a member of the Miami Heat. It’s getting rarer and rarer in the modern NBA for a player to stay so long with the team that drafted them, but that’s the situation that Wade currently finds himself in.

If reports are to be believed that could be about to change though. Barry Jackson of the Miami Herald reported last Thursday that Wade and the Heat were very far away from reaching an agreement on a deal that could see the star extend his stay on South Beach.

"Though Wade prefers to stay with the Heat, where he has spent his entire 12-year career, he is now open to considering other teams this summer if the Heat does not raise its offer, according to three sources with direct knowledge.Wade must decide by late June whether to opt out of a contract that would pay him $16.1 million next season.The Heat wants to keep him but believes that paying him what he’s seeking would dramatically reduce its flexibility to add additional players during the summers of 2016 and 2017."

It’s not as simple as Wade being met with a valuation that reflects his worth this summer either, as he undoubtedly feels he has earned the right to be looked after a little bit better by the franchise.

That sense of entitlement when it comes to veteran superstars can be a contentious issue, but in this case Wade might just have a point.

As Jackson noted in his piece:

"Last summer, in order to give the Heat flexibility to augment its roster, Wade opted out of the final two years of a contract that would have paid him $41.6 million. He instead accepted a two-year, $31 million deal, which included a player option for next season at $16.1 million.Wade said last summer that he was curious to see what he could command in the summer of 2016, when the cap is expected to skyrocket from $67 million to $89 million. That led to the belief that Wade would opt-in this summer.But according to associates, Wade wants to opt out this summer, with the hope that the Heat would give him a lucrative three-year deal that would extend past his 36th birthday."

Wade showcased his loyalty to the franchise in taking less money at a time when the team was looking to retain LeBron James, and then was ultimately forced into planning for life without him. In this case, that doesn’t make it difficult to understand why Wade feels he’s owed something.

At the same time, he’s not being frivolous either. Wade is not asking for a franchise crippling $25-30 million deal like Kobe Bryant took from the Lakers, in fact with the rising cap, his request isn’t even as hefty as it once would have seemed.

In a post yesterday, Jackson shone a further light on Wade’s requests.

"A Wade associate has told people that Wade would welcome a contract averaging $20 million annually over the next three years. If that’s true, it would be understandable, considering the year 13-15 pay ranges for Duncan and Nowitzki. Wade’s agent, Henry Thomas, politely declined to confirm that or anything regarding Wade’s specific financial expectations."

With Bleacher Report’s Ethan J. Skolnick now indicating that Miami’s opening offer to Wade was in fact valued at less than $10m a year, the gap between the two sides can only be significantly widening. Therefore the idea of Wade playing elsewhere next year appears to be a genuine possibility.

Where do the Bucks fit in all of this you might ask?

The reality is probably somewhere far, far away from where Wade will end up. Saying that though, there’s a connection between Wade and the state of Wisconsin, and as a result, it’s something that has cropped up in this summer’s conversation for Bucks fans.

Wade played his college ball at Marquette University, and although that may seem trivial in an NBA sense, these are the sort of the connections that have been deemed more and more important in recent years as stars have put more and more thought into where they want to play.

That’s been enough to lead to chatter among Bucks fans on some internet forums, and the blog posts have already started exploring the notion (such as this one from Ben Parker).

If Wade was to opt out and the rift between him and the Heat continued to grow, it would only be logical to expect the rumors connecting him and Milwaukee to intensify.

Is there any real substance to them?

No.

Should Bucks fans be expecting to see D-Wade in green and cream next season?

Of course not!

It is an intriguing thought though. It wouldn’t be in keeping with the current shape of team building, but for a couple of years anyway the prospect of Wade, Jabari Parker and Giannis Antetokounmpo would be incredibly exciting.

It would likely put paid to Milwaukee’s chances of keeping Khris Middleton this summer though, and have more long term salary repercussions when some of their other prospects come up for renewal.

Is that something that the team would seem likely to risk?

My instinct would be a resounding no, but then again, the NBA can be a strange place.

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