Bulls Aggressively Pursuing Dwyane Wade

“I played on eight teams since college”, Whiteside told the Players Tribune on Friday. “I’m not ready for there to be a ninth”. Miami Heat are in a tough situation at the moment as they are pursuing Kevin Durant and they have only around $20 million left to spend.

Considering that Wade’s last offer from the Heat was reportedly around million per year, this is most likely just Wade trying to get the Heat to up their offer a little bit. Pat Riley knows that the Heat could no longer win with Wade without another stars out there that his priority would be to lure Kevin Durant and Hassan Whiteside first. Mozgov came to an unexpected and quick four-year, $64 million agreement with the Los Angeles Lakers according to The Vertical’s Adrian Wojnarowski less than an hour into free agency.

As long as Durant’s free agency goes as expected and he stays in Oklahoma City, though, it seems obvious Wade will still return to Miami. The other three teams Wojnarowski named were the Denver Nuggets, the Milwaukee Bucks and the Chicago Bulls. He has options. He also has negotiating power, being able to bring richer deals to the Heat’s table and force them to match if they want to keep Wade in Wade County.

Wade been with the team through three championships, and has played through plenty of basement-dwelling seasons in his Hall of Fame-worthy career. The same thing could happen this summer, but the Heat will have to act fast as Wade is already engaged in talks with other teams.

The Bulls pursuit of Wade seemingly indicates that the front office is not clear on the direction that they want to take the team.

Less than two years after coming to Miami, Whiteside has become one of the game’s most dominant centers – and one of the highest-paid players in Miami franchise history. Wade wants to be compensated for taking pay cuts on three straight contracts, and Miami isn’t now offering him the money he wants.