“Dear Steve,
When I saw news of your retirement I was dismayed, but I can’t say I was surprised. Your back problems were well-publicized. It was then that I made a resolution to myself. Although your dream of winning a championship had been abandoned, I vowed to continue in that quest. Not just for me. For us.
Well, my friend, I’m afraid that the dream has likewise ended for me. I thought the Heat would contend this year; I was wrong. And now I have come to realize that I don’t have another year left in me.
Let me correct myself. I do have another five years left in my heart. But my knees have made other plans, and they don’t include winning an NBA championship. God, the pain is so bad these days. The average fan doesn’t know to what lengths I have to go through just to be physically ready to play the ten minutes I get per night.
Tonight I dunked the ball. Remember how much I dunked it in Phoenix? It was a flashback to those good times. But when I landed, my knees cried out in agony. I could barely stumble to the bench. When the game came to its blessed end and I finally arrived in my hotel room, I had my concubines draw a red wine bath for me. But the wine did nothing, Steve! Nothing! I lay in the bathtub, consumed by pain, until my skin had pruned and taken on a burgundy tinge, yet my knees still pained me as if the dunk had been only minutes before. It’s never been this bad before.
This is the end, Steve. There is no championship in my future. There is only pain. One day I may emerge from the other side of this darkness. Then again, I may not. Time is the teller of all things.
I’m so sorry.
-Amar’e”