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Here's Dwyane Wade's "photo bomb" from last night. It's all fun and games in Miami as the team heads to Cleveland and Toronto for a holiday road trip. Miami has won seven consecutive games.
News of Derrick Rose’s knee injury cast a somber mood over the entire NBA on Saturday. At AmericanAirlines Arena, Heat coach Erik Spoelstra and players Dwyane Wade and LeBron James expressed sadness for the former MVP, who will need surgery to correct a torn meniscus.
“I feel extremely bad for him,” James said. “I was actually watching the game last night and that’s the one thing that I feared the most, that he had hurt his knee pretty bad. And it sucks. I’m disappointed for him. I’m sad for him. Everything. The guy worked so hard to get back on the floor.”
Rose left the Bulls’ game on Friday at Portland’s Rose Garden after a non-contact injury to his right knee. He received an MRI in Los Angeles to confirm his torn meniscus. Rose tore the anterior-cruciate ligament in his left knee during 2012 playoffs. He then missed the entire 2012-13 season.
Depending on the extent of the injury, Rose could either have his meniscus removed, shaved away or reattached. Players usually can return from injuries sooner if the meniscus is removed but, in some cases, it can affect them later in their career, according to Wade. Wade had his meniscus removed after his first season at Marquette and said the procedure “opened me up to knee trouble and knee problems.”
Wade wasn’t given any options for different procedures in college.
“I wasn’t educated on it,” Wade said. “I didn’t know. I just knew it was hurting and I wanted it fixed. That was after my first year at Marquette and I never dealt with any injury until that time. It was all new to me and I wanted to get back on the court.”
Wade added that Rose should seek an expert before making a decision on what type of surgery to have, if Rose indeed has an option medically.
"The only thing you can do is hopefully the doctor that you choose will give you the best advice," Rose said. "You just hope the experts give you the best advice and you make the best decision for yourself."
Heat coach Erik Spoelstra learned about Rose’s injury just before walking into his pregame news conference with reporters.
“That’s horrible news,” Spoelstra said. “As competitors, you have that in a certain box, but at the same time you want to see guys out there. You know how much he has put into getting back to playing and he is too good for the game to not be out there playing.
“If I were just an average fan and not working for the Miami Heat, I would tune into their games to watch Derrick Rose play. So hopefully it’s not too bad. Hopefully he can come back soon.”
The Heat will wear red jerseys tonight and here's the new intro video to help market the look. Just in time for the holidays.
SARCASM: (n) Harsh or bitter derision or irony.
Dwyane Wade is the Heat's fashion guru, but he's not the team's most stylish player according to GQ. The magazine ranked Wade ninth in a list of "20 Most Stylish Athletes of 2013" and named LeBron James No.1.
Naturally, Wade was livid.
"That was bogus," Wade said. "I have to talk to my guys at GQ."
Wade has worked with GQ for several years now on various projects, but his buddies at the magazine apparently had no editorial control over this particular list ... or maybe they did. Wade suggested the fix might be in and that maybe LeBron paid off somebody for the top ranking!
"He's No. 1 in a lot of areas in life, but that ain't it," Wade said. "Congratulations to him or whoever he paid to get that."
Wade sells socks and ties and he wants you to buy some for Christmas. LeBron owns a clothing store in Aventura Mall. I went to Aventura Mall once. Never again.
ORLANDO — Dwyane Wade missed his second straight game on Wednesday due to soreness in his knee and Heat coach Erik Spoelstra indicated that more scheduled rest could be in store for the Heat’s starting shooting guard.
Wade attempted to play in back-to-back games on Friday and Saturday for the first time this season but appeared to experience a physical setback on the second night of the demanding home-and-away set. Wade went to the locker room before Saturday’s game ended in Charlotte and then was a late scratch on Tuesday against the Hawks. He traveled with the team to Orlando but did not play.
Heat coach Erik Spoelstra stressed before the game that the Heat wants “to make sure that [Wade] is getting stronger and feeling better as the season goes on.” Wade appeared to be in good spirits in the Heat’s pregame locker room at Amway Center and even cracked a joke with reporters. Wade did not speak on the record, though, per team’s media policy for injured players.
James Jones started for the second night in a row in place of Wade.
“Health is No.1 for us,” LeBron James said. “In order for us to compete for a championship, at the end of the day, we have to be healthy or as close to healthy as possible. And we understand that.
“D-Wade is definitely a huge part of the puzzle, so we want him to feel as comfortable as possible when he’s ready to come back.”
Wade played with pain in his knee during the Heat’s 2013 championship run and underwent OssaTron shock wave therapy this summer in an attempt to stimulate healing. Full recovery from the therapy could be as long as six months.
“It has been an ongoing thing,” James said. “He’s feeling a lot better this year than he was last year, but he wants to be smart about it and we respect that.”
Spoelstra said Wade would be evaluated on a day-to-day basis. He sat out the second night of the Heat’s first back-to-back of the season, and the decision for him to play against Charlotte was based on how he felt at the time, Spoelstra said before Wednesday’s game. Initially, Wade didn’t expect to play against the Bobcats, but the Heat was shorthanded after Mario Chalmers was suspended by the NBA and Ray Allen was out with flu-like symptoms.
“Over the weekend, it was sore, so we wanted to use these last couple of days to get him healthy and then get him back training, start building his legs back up and, as we said, there is no other way to assess it but day by day,” Spoelstra said. “He could wake up tomorrow and feel incredible and then we’ll go from there. So, we’ll just see how he feels tomorrow.
“We do have a plan and we want to be patient with it. We want to be disciplined with it, considering all the circumstances.”
Wade has played in nine games this season and is averaging 16.7 points per game. He set a career-high for steals against the Mavericks on Friday and the following night went 1 of 7 from the field for four points against Charlotte.
“He’s ahead of schedule from where we anticipated probably in July after the OssaTron therapy but we know with these procedures that it will take time and we’ll be patient with it and monitor and have constant communication,” Spoelstra said. “It’s part of the process and when we talked about it coming into training camp we knew there would be a lot of speculation, every move. And that’s where the discipline comes. We do have a plan but the plan is to evaluate every day and that’s probably not the answer everyone wants to hear.”
LeBron James confirmed on Monday that he has spoken with David Beckham about possibly owning a share of an MLS franchise in Miami. The Daily Mail first reported the story.
Here's my brief Q&A with LeBron about Beckham and soccer in Miami:
Q: How far along are talks with David Beckham of a potential investment in a soccer team?
"There is some interest on both sides. David has become a good friend of mine over the last few years and I think it would be great for this city to have a football club. There is interest on both sides, but it’s preliminary talks but there is some open dialogue."
Q: What do you think the potential is for MLS in Miami?
“We don’t know. The research is still being made out but I think it could be huge. But, you never know. I think this is a great town for soccer. There are a lot of soccer players here. There’s a great youth [system] of soccer here. And people love the city as well, so that definitely will help.
Do you feel like Miami is definitely going to get an MLS team at this point?
"We don’t know. I don’t know. It’s like buying a house. You don’t know until you sign the papers."
LeBron and his business associates own a small share in Liverpool FC. His relationship with Liverpool has contributed to his overall interest in soccer.
“I’ve grown a great interest in watching the game and learning it and it’s a pretty intense sport," James said. "And my kids love it as well. But I’ve grown to the point where I know exactly what’s going on when I’m watching the game."
The NBA suspended Mario Chalmers for Saturday's game against the Charlotte Bobcats after reviewing Chalmers hard foul on Dirk Nowitzki on Friday night.
Chalmers appeared to swing an arm at Nowitzki while trying to fight through a screen with 5:01 left in the fourth quarter of the Heat's 110-104 victory. The foul was upgraded to Flagrant 2 during the game and Chalmers was ejected. The NBA then suspended Chalmers one game for the incident.
Here's the foul on Blake Griffin:
So, the jerseys were leaked already, but that doesn't make the annual release of the NBA's Christmas apparel any less exciting. The Christmas jerseys this season will have sleeves and they're already on sale at the NBA store for $109.95. To sell the shirts, the NBA put together a slick commercial, featuring LeBron James dunking an alley-oop at the end.
And here's the story about it. CLICK ME!
Tuesday's game against the Milwaukee Bucks comes three days after the Heat's first loss at home. The team supposedly recommitted itself defensively during the off days with Erik Spoelstra emphasizing that side of the ball during practice.
On Monday, Heat owner Micky Arison, team president Pat Riley and Heat CEO Nick Arison attended practice. That's not unusual, but the presence of the Heat's executives gave an indication of how displeased the Heat is with its start to the regular season. LeBron James said he was only worried about defeating the Bucks when asked about the Heat's favorable schedule over the next few weeks. The Heat doesn't play a legitimate contender for the Eastern or Western Conferences until Dec. 5 when it plays the Bulls at United Center.
“I’m only worried about Milwaukee," James said. "We’ve got to win tomorrow.”
James said Celtics forward Jeff Green hitting his game-winning shot on Saturday served as a wake-up call.
"We needed that," James said. "We come out of that game with a win, it’s a totally different story, but I think [Green] making that shot just tells the tale of what the hell has been going on with our season so far.”
With losses to the Sixers and Celtics, the Heat's defensive malaise to begin the season has been obvious. James said it was unacceptable and also suggested some players coming off injuries needed to step up their games. Wade had an offseason procedure on his knee after struggling through the 2013 playoffs and, in sitting out the second night of back to backs, has taken a cautious approach to begin the season.
"It’s an issue for everyone but you’ve got to figure out a way to go out and play motivated every night," James said. "Through seven games we played unmotivated basketball and I don’t know if it’s going through the motions, or guys are injured or coming off of injuries or a long season/short summer."
Whatever the reason for the Heat's apathy, James said it was corrected during Monday's practice.
"I don’t know what it is, but it was a great day for us," James said.
