The name Dwayne Wade is synonymous with Miami’s history in the NBA. Since being drafted in 2003, he brought three championships to South Beach and established himself as a legend in the NBA, something his father, Dwayne Wade Sr., still finds hard to comprehend.
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For any dad, it’s a proud moment to realize their son has made it. For the son, it’s the realization that they made their father proud. That look was visible on Wade’s face when he appeared on his podcast with his father Wade Sr. and Bob Metelus brought up his career.
He asked Wade Sr. how he felt about being the dad of a Hall of Famer. And looking back on all the difficulties they went through when D-Wade was growing up, including the uncertainty, it admittedly felt surreal.
“Still to this day, it’s unreal,” the father of the Miami Heat icon said. “You always talked about you wanted someone in your family to be famous or to make it, but when they make it, you’re like, ‘Damn, we did that for real?”
Saying ‘Wade did it’ would be an understatement. He retired as a 13-time All-Star, the 2006 Finals MVP, and got into the All-NBA team 11 times. Together with LeBron James and Chris Bosh, he also shook the league with his Championship wins in 2012 and 2013, not to discount the one he won leading the line.
Wade Sr. continued, “To me today, I am still stunned. And now he’s great? He’s one of the greatest? Who would have thought he would become one of the greatest players, and he only jumped this high,” he added, ending with a small joke about his jump.
“But, I’m proud, I’m really proud. It’s a feeling that you never really can talk about. You can’t explain it. Because, it happened and you didn’t think it was going to happen, but you just wanted it to happen.”
When people ask Wade Sr. how he feels, he simply replies that he, “still don’t know how to feel.”
Wade left Miami in 2016 and spent a season each at the Chicago Bulls (his hometown team) and then the Cleveland Cavaliers before returning for one final hurrah in Florida. He retired in 2019, and has since started making waves off the court.
He invested in a bunch of brands, and even founded the Wade’s World Foundation, which aims at empowering children of at-risk families. Wade is also working hard at promoting the women’s game, having become a part-owner of Chicago Sky in the WNBA.
Wade won the court, and now he’s winning off it.
