Dwyane Wade‘s career is certainly one to be jealous of. 3 Championships, 1 Finals MVP, and 13 All-Star selections, combined with a fair few memorable moments and records, all resulted in the Flash being inducted into the Hall of Fame last year. But all this may not have happened had one thing gone wrong during his childhood.
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D-Wade recently sat down with his father for an episode of The Wine Down with Dwyane Wade. Throughout the entire episode, Wade narrated a story from his childhood that almost took his life, robbing the world of the future Miami Heat legend.
“My dad always growing up, he would go play at the lakefront, he would take us as we were growing up. So, we’re down there hooping, bro, I had a little attitude problem and somebody fouled me. I just took the ball, and I just slung it at their head.”
“When I tell you, it got scary and fast. You saw the gun go…I was like, ‘Oh-Oh!’ So, we came to find out that this guy was like one of the leaders of the gangs in Chicago. And yeah, we was outnumbered.”
Dwayne Wade mentioned how he lost his cool and threw the ball at the person who fouled him. In retaliation, the person threw the ball back faster than even The Flash could react and made contact with his head.
Before a young D-Wade could do anything, the person who he got into an altercation with pulled out a gun and things escalated quickly. If it wasn’t for Dwyane Wade Sr., the world may never have gotten to see The Flash on the hardwood floor.
“I had a friend that was playing with us that knew all of them. And he was like, ‘Bro, they’re my boys. That’s his son, let it slide. That was a dangerous time though. We might not have gotten to see him in the NBA, bro.”
Wade claimed that he wasn’t sure they’d get the opportunity to leave the park alive that day.
Throughout his 16-year-long NBA career, Dwyane Wade has often talked about his rough childhood and the humble beginnings he had growing up in Chicago. A 2017 interview with CNN revealed Wade describing his neighborhood and the gun violence he had to witness growing up.
During his time with the Chicago Bulls, one of the first things Wade had to deal with was the killing of his cousin’s sister, Nykea Aldridge. The 32-year-old mother of four was caught in gang crossfire when she was pushing her baby in a stroller on the sidewalk.
Dwayne Wade did not have the safest childhood growing up, but he surely made the most of his life, making it to the NBA and eventually hanging his sneakers as a Hall of Famer.
