Miami Heat's sacrifices are for love of the game
HEAT | UDONIS HASLEM
Udonis Haslem meant so much to Dwyane Wade that Wade sacrificed millions to keep his friend in Miami.
miamiherald.com
 "Our bond is beyond basketball. It's love. It's not business. It's family. I would do anything for Dwyane," said Heat forward Udonis Haslem, left, about teammate Dwyane Wade, right.
JEFFREY M. BOAN / STAFF FILE PHOTO
By DAN LE BATARD
dlebatard@MiamiHerald.com
There's an uncommon story pulsating at the heart of this Miami Heat team, somehow buried beneath the angry noise and burning jerseys smoldering all around LeBron James.
What about the other hour? The one that wasn't televised?
Is it possible in this hostile climate, around the most hated team in America, for people to even notice the love story?
``It's confusing and unfortunate to me that people don't really see what we did,'' Miami's Udonis Haslem said.
Haslem, loyal employee, team player and proud Miamian, was on the way to what he thought was his exit interview, to thank Pat Riley for discovering him and to say goodbye. The Denver Nuggets and Dallas Mavericks were offering him $34 million, and Haslem was telling his buddy Dwyane Wade by text that all his good time in Miami was now done.
Haslem knew Miami didn't have enough money remaining to compete with Dallas and Denver after signing James, Wade and Chris Bosh, and he couldn't take a one-year minimum contract in Miami with his ill mother dying and family members to support. He had taken millions less once to re-sign here and remain near his beloved Liberty City. He couldn't ignore an extra $30 million now, on perhaps his last contract, no matter how much he loved this city and organization and Wade.
``You'll always be my brother,'' Haslem texted Wade as he walked into Riley's office to say goodbye.
UNPRECEDENTED
Something that doesn't have a lot of precedent in American sports happened then. Wade called Bosh and asked him to cut $15 million off his salary for Haslem. Wade called James and asked him to do the same. Bosh and James barely knew Haslem. Just a few short conversations here and there. But Wade told them this team needed someone hungry and gritty and unselfish like Haslem, and promised to cut $17 million out of his own contract to make it happen, too.
``They said `I'm in' without hesitating,'' Wade said Sunday.
What?
``No questions asked,'' Wade said.
None?
``Not one,'' Wade said. ``They respected UD as a player. And they trusted me as a leader and friend.''
Haslem was in the middle of what he thought was his exit meeting with Riley when Haslem's agent came into the room. Heat owner Micky Arison walked in, too, with Heat numbers savant Andy Elisburg, all of them working to figure out how to get Haslem to $20 million and make room for Haslem's ex-University of Florida teammate Mike Miller, too. Haslem was asked to please leave the room.
``Everything changed in that one hour,'' Haslem says. ``I was outside, and I didn't know what was going on. I figured I was pretty much gone.''
Then his agent emerged with an offer $14 million less than what was being offered in Dallas and Denver.
``It took me less than five minutes to accept it,'' Haslem says.
Haslem reached out to James and Bosh after his agent explained what they had done. ``Thank you,'' he told them. ``You didn't make a mistake. I won't let you down.''
And he called Wade with words not often heard in this muscled world.
``I love you,'' he said.
This was hardly about charity. Wade was very close friends with Dorell Wright, too, and he didn't do this for him. Wade wanted someone on his side who, like Matt Damon's friends in Goodwill Hunting, would take a bat to the head for him. He figured this team -- ``the most hated sports team of my era,'' as Haslem calls it -- would need a rugged man like that.
``This wouldn't have felt complete or whole without him,'' Wade says. ``The bigger picture is about sacrifice. We are sacrificing recognition, shots, minutes, money. People say athletes are selfish and care only about money, but they're going to have to find another way to criticize us here.''
FAMILY FIRST
Haslem is a hard, tough man covered in scowls and muscles and tattoos. He has been Miami's scrappy enforcer for years. He doesn't do a lot of smiling and is not a man prone to syrupy expressions of affection in this world of testosterone and machismo. But you can hear his voice give a little when talking about what Wade and this team did for him.
``Our bond is beyond basketball,'' Haslem says. ``It's love. It's not business. It's family. I would do anything for Dwyane. That gesture has no price. Family has no price. Fourteen million dollars doesn't add up to what I would have been leaving behind.''
Haslem had been an emotional mess for months, as his ill mother withered away, shuttling her between doctors and nurses and appointments. He had discussed with her the possibility that he might leave Miami, and, like all good mothers, she implored him to do whatever made him happiest.
When he returned to her hospital bed after what was supposed to be his exit meeting, to tell her what the new members of her favorite team had done, his mother, a woman of profound faith, closed her eyes and gave praise to God. She felt so grateful and blessed that her son was surrounded by so many people who loved and supported and valued him.
``It was the last time,'' Haslem says, ``that I got to see her smile.''
You don't forget things like that, not as long as you live. You don't forget the friends who gave and loved and sacrificed and let you lean on them when you were weak. You don't forget, at your mother's wake, when Riley walks into the room trailed by Heat employee after Heat employee and Heat teammate after Heat teammate.
Denver and Dallas had more money under the salary cap, millions more, but they didn't have anything at all that could compete with that.
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