Dragic returns. And Wade offers some interesting, thoughtful comments on Waiters.
Guard Goran Dragic has been cleared to return in Friday night’s game against the New York Knicks after missing nine games with a groin injury.
“He felt like he was ready a week ago,” coach Erik Spoelstra said, noting Jimmy Butler came to AmericanAirlines Arena on an off-day Thursday merely to watch Dragic work out.
Dragic is averaging 15.5 points in 18 games and has been an instrumental component off the bench.
But Justise Winslow remains out with a lower back injury that has sidelined him for eight games, including Friday’s Knicks game. Winslow missed nine games earlier this season because of a concussion.
Forward James Johnson returned to the team after missing three games for personal reasons.
▪ A day after Chris Bosh was named a nominee for 2020 induction into the Basketball Hall of Fame, Spoelstra endorsed his candidacy. Spoelstra cited not only his production but his sacrifice which cost him additional tangible statistics during the four years of the Big Three era.
“Hopefully [he] gets inducted,” Spoelstra said.
WADE ADDRESSES WAITERS
While the Heat appears to have lost patience with thrice-suspended guard Dion Waiters, former Heat guard Dwyane Wade offered compassion for Waiters this week, suggesting there are challenges for players who come from inner city backgrounds and that Waiters “doesn’t know how to navigate through this world” when basketball is taken away from him.
“It’s unfortunate what’s going on with him,” Wade said on the All The Smoke podcast with former NBA players Matt Barnes and Stephen Jackson. “The kid loves to hoop. What we’re seeing right now is now that the game was taken away from him, he doesn’t know how to deal with it.
“He came out and said that last year being hurt, trying to come back and live up to whatever these expectations were. He was disappointed in himself how he played last year. When he doesn’t have hoop, he doesn’t know how to navigate through this world.
“Once again, that tells you, you taking kids out of inner city and throw them in this big world and expect them to be perfect. But you’re not. Unfortunately, it takes a lot of instances that Dion is going through to get you to understand and to learn.
“Hopefully he can catch it before it’s too late and he’s not looking on the outside looking in and saying ‘Man, I want to get back in and get another opportunity.” Hopefully people around him can continue to keep guiding him and let him know don’t let this opportunity you have slide away.
“He’s a hooper. He’s one of the best when healthy, Pat Riley, when he’s in shape, when his mind is right. But you’ve got to understand. It’s not so easy to say he should do X, Y and Z. That’s not how he was raised. It’s a tough situation.”
Wade said he keeps in touch with Waiters: “That’s my little brother. Before he became a Miami Heat, we stayed in contact.”
After two previous suspensions covering 11 games, Waiters is now serving a six-game suspension for violation of team rules and insubordination.
He’s eligible to return after the Dec. 23 game against Utah, but the Heat would prefer to part ways, according to multiple sources, and have been trying to come up with a solution that is acceptable to both parties. He hasn’t appeared in a game this season and his contract runs through next season, with Waiters due $12.7 million in 2020-21.
Meanwhile, Wade addressed other issues in the podcast:
▪ On Riley and how the relationship evolved after he left for a season-and-half (first to Chicago, then to Cleveland, before the Heat re-acquired him): “We got a great relationship. That moment, neither one of us wished to this day that it happened. We dealt with it. We talked man to man, face to face.
“Pat knows how I feel about him. I have been very open about how I feel, very open about how that went down. Once I came back, I had more appreciation for the organization and... city and vice versa. Everybody says, ‘You should have been a lifer, that should never have happened.’ But it was the best thing that it happened. We saw each other in a different light once I wasn’t there, both ways.
“I’m one of those players that shouldn’t have left. I’m supposed to be one of those players [who spent their entire careers with one organization] - The Dirk’s, the Kobe’s, the Duncan’s. But it happened.
“There’s a lot of reasons that it happened but for me, actually, once it did I made the best of it. I went to Chicago, went back home, and I took a different approach. I really focused on the community in Chicago. That was huge for me because I lost a family member a couple days after I decided to go to Chicago.”
▪ On his desire to work again for the Heat one day: “I’m so happy the success is still going for the Heat. As I get away from the game and do some other things I want to do, eventually I would love to migrate back to the organization as I figure out what my life is going to be about and continue to give back to that city as they gave to me for so many years.”
▪ On his son Zaire Wade playing high school basketball with LeBron James, Jr.:
“You see (LeBron) on the sideline, you see me on the sideline, and we get into it from a fan perspective and just supportive parents’ perspective as well. We’re crazy as hell on that sideline just like the rest of the parents in the world.
“Just because we played the sport doesn’t mean we’re not just like everyone else. So that’s been cool from that perspective, to be able to create a memory for those guys. It’s a moment that’s happening for them, [with a few of their games] on ESPN.”
▪ On the public nature of his relationship with wife Gabrielle Union:
“It’s been tough at times, I ain’t gonna lie to you. [Expletive] ain’t been easy. But I think ultimately for us, we both love each other, we both are committed to supporting each other. So we figured it out.
“But there’s definitely times where we have to go through the [expletive] together...I’ve grown so much in my relationship with this woman. But she’s somebody who I feel like can help the world change. She can definitely change the world.”
Wade’s appearance on ALL THE SMOKE episode nine is available in video and audio formats on the new SHOWTIME Basketball YouTube channel and on major podcast platforms as well as the radio.com app.
This story was originally published December 19, 2019 at 5:29 PM.
