The Miami Heat on Sunday, honoured arguably the franchise’s greatest ever player, Dwyane Wade, with a statue outside its Kaseya Center home in Florida, Afrosport reports.
In a star-studded ceremony that had the likes of team president Pat Riley, Udonis Haslem, Bam Adebayo, WNBA MVP A’ja Wilson, and Wade’s wife and Hollywood star Gabrielle Union in attendance, Hall of Famer Wade became the first Heat player with a statue in franchise history.
Our franchise’s greatest legacy, forever cemented pic.twitter.com/0wBDQ3Cz2C
— Miami HEAT (@MiamiHEAT) October 27, 2024
The statue, which was designed by Oscar León and Omri Amrany, the artists behind Michael Jordan’s statue in Chicago and Kobe Bryant’s in Los Angeles, is a depiction of Wade’s infamous “This is my house” gesture.
The statue captured the magical moment when Wade hit the game winner after double overtime to lead Miami past the Chicago Bulls on March 9, 2009, after which he climbed on top of the scorer’s table and screamed out, “This is my house!”
“This is crazy,” Wade said after the unveiling. “I wanted to feel this. Life goes by so fast and it’s very rare that we get to feel things, because we’re always off to the next thing… I wanted to feel this, man. I wanted to look at it.
“I am one of the luckiest men in the world, not because people don’t say no to me, but because people believe in me. When you are growing up and you are young, people don’t believe in you; they don’t believe in your dreams.
“If I had told someone that one day my dream is to go to the NBA and win three championships, make 13 all-star appearances, play with some of the greatest players ever, have a statue one day, and have my jersey retired, you think some would have told me that was going to happen? No one is going to believe in your dreams unless they see you working toward that dream,” Wade added.
More permanent than the 🔑 under the mat pic.twitter.com/Z6rPHKPNaa
— Miami HEAT (@MiamiHEAT) October 27, 2024
Wade, the Heat’s all-time leading scorer, initially played for the franchise from 2003 to 2016 before returning in the 2018-19 season, his final campaign in the NBA.
He led Miami to three NBA championships in 2006, 2012, and 2013 and was named the Finals MVP in their first title run. The 13-time All-Star led the league in scoring in 2009 and averaged 22.7 points, 4.7 rebounds, and 5.6 assists in 948 regular-season games for Miami.
Wade, who is widely renowned as one of the best shooting guards in NBA history, is one of only six players to have their jersey retired by the Heat. The list includes Haslem, Chris Bosh, Tim Hardaway, Shaquille O’Neal, and Alonzo Mourning.
