What a night for the NBA, and what a night for Dwyane Wade. If I was the conspiratorial type, I would sincerely believe that the NBA scripted this 30-burger for Wade in his final home game. Maybe by itself, you can believe it, but combined with Dirk Nowitzki’s 30-burger (also in his final home game) and Jamal Crawford’s 50-burger (in maybe his final game, period), am I supposed to believe that this wasn’t all planned out from the beginning of the season?
Basketball is harder to script than other sports, since players still have to be able to make shots, but with Wade, that’s not usually a problem. They (“they” being the shadowy cabal of power-brokers controlling the strings of the NBA) told him he needed to dunk it for his first bucket, so he did. They told him he needed to hit a bunch of improbable threes to bring the crowd to hysterics, so he did. They told him he needed to get Yante Maten to hit a shot, and… he actually failed at that one. Oops! This cabal doesn’t like it when you don’t follow their orders!
I have the overwhelming feeling that I’m watching some sort of an “end of an era” right now. Wade has been a huge part of not only the Miami Heat, but the NBA, for a long time now. Same with Dirk. People were prognosticating about Manu Ginboili’s retirement last year, that the NBA “wouldn’t be the same”, but it turns out that it sort of is. I’m not so sure this time.
I’m also not sure that this is really it for Wade. People keep telling me that it is, and he sure is acting like it is, and so is everyone else, but the proof is in the pudding. How many consecutive double-digit scoring games does he have now? That’s why he didn’t get the big pops when he scored, unlike Dirk. Because people know he can still score. I’m not saying goodbye yet. Not until a whole season has passed with him not begging Riley to play again.
Also, I want to apologize for not writing some sort of epic heartwarming story for Wade like I did with Nowitzki. I don’t have the energy, plus I have a big backlog of stuff to do and not much time. Oh well. No reason I can’t take out this description and replace it with a better one in a few days when no one is looking.