Dwyane Wade was almost not selected to be part of the iconic Redeem Team representing USA at the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games. During the tail end of the 2007-2008 NBA season, he suffered a shoulder injury and was expected to be out for the summer.
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However, wanting redemption for the 2004 Athens Games’ humiliating 3rd place finish, the Miami Heat star wanted to join his fellow Olympians in Beijing. He even went bald to “channel something like Michael Jordan”.
Wade surprised everyone on the 2008 USA roster by making it to the training camp ahead of the Olympics. Apart from recovering from the injury, the shooting guard also caught the whole team off guard with his new hairdo – a shiny bald head.
On an episode of his podcast, the three-time NBA champion explained the thought process behind doing so.
Apart from the fact that no barber was present to give him a cut of his preference, The Flash also wanted to channel his inner Michael Jordan to redeem himself (redemption was somewhat of a theme for the 2008 team). Wade would often go bald even in his school days and would “ball out” when he needed to prove something.
“I ain’t got no barber traveling with us, you don’t want nobody messing with your head. But two, when I was in high school, I had a couple moments where I went bald head and it was either somebody f**k my hair up and I had to cut it bald or I was trying to channel something like MJ.”
“Every time I did it, I balled out… So when I was going to the Olympics it was the redeem. It was redeem for our team, it was redeem for obviously individual players… and mine was a comeback from health and show everybody I am who I am. So I went bald,” Wade revealed.
D-Wade would not only return to the court following his injury but also achieve his goal of “balling out”. Wade was the leading scorer on the American team with 16 points per game and also recorded 4 rebounds and 2.3 steals to help his nation win gold once again.
Why did D-Wade push himself so hard during the 2008 Olympics?
Wade was part of the USA team that had an embarrassing third-place finish at the Athens Games in 2004. He also committed to the USA Basketball’s three-year commitment to prepare for the 2008 Olympics.
During this same period, Wade was also an integral part of the 2006 FIBA World Championship squad that finished third again.
Following these losses, basketball enthusiasts claimed that basketball wasn’t an “American sport” anymore. To prove this narrative wrong, Wade pushed himself during the 2008 Olympic campaign. After the release of the documentary “Redeem Team”, the former combo guard spoke about his mentality at the time.
“Because of ’04. I was a part of it now. And in ’06, we lost again, in Worlds in Japan. I took some hard Ls back to the States. It was embarrassing.
I worked my butt off to be a part of the team because I wanted to win a gold medal. I wanted to redeem us as a team, but also at that time of my life, I wanted redemption for myself. A lot of people said it was over for me,” Wade told TIME why he pushed himself.
Wade got the redemption that he was searching for by helping his team win the gold medal, thanks to an impressive 27-point outing in the final clash against Spain.
