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Big NBA Fan wrote:Another interesting fact is that Barry Jackson said that someone close to Shaq said that he actually wanted to return to Miami in 2010, but the Heat had no interest.

His big mouth cost him another ring. I mean, it goes to show just how ugly his exit was that they never considered bringing him back and yet brought back one of the biggest busts in NBA history (Beasley) twice.

Heat3 wrote:

Big NBA Fan wrote:Another interesting fact is that Barry Jackson said that someone close to Shaq said that he actually wanted to return to Miami in 2010, but the Heat had no interest.

His big mouth cost him another ring. I mean, it goes to show just how ugly his exit was that they never considered bringing him back and yet brought back one of the biggest busts in NBA history (Beasley) twice.

haha I'm glad they said no. I wanted him to finish his career here in Miami but the way he went out, screw him. All he had to do was play nice. He could have been in Big Z's role.

Tim_Hardawayy wrote:Wade should have had more time off to recover from his offseason surgeries, but we went 0-5 in our first 5 games without him, so he rushed back. He was never right physically that year, even in the games where he played well he could barely dunk or use any lateral quickness, and was doing it purely on bball IQ and shooting.

We tried to resurrect Penny Hardaway's career with Shaq, it was cool seeing the two of them on the court together but Penny gave us next to nothing. Ricky Davis was extremely flawed as already stated. Smush Parker, Mark Blount and Chris Quinn being rotation players didn't help us any either. The Antoine Walker trade was a mistake but it was Riley doing his best at the time to try to get something, anything, to support Shaq and Zo since he hates throwing away seasons.

Then we started losing a bunch of close games even after Wade came back as stated, fell into a pretty huge hole, Zo went down to injury, and I think at that point any morale the team had was gone. Shaq got traded shortly after that, and when it became apparent Wade wasn't going to be himself without some time off to recover and we were still losing games even with Marion, the full tank was in motion.

If we don't trade Walker (still think he's a better presence than Davis/Blount combo not even considering it'd have saved us long term money), if Wade had another month or two to properly recover, if Zo doesn't have his career ending injury, if Penny actually had something left in the tank, and if we played just a bit better in a few of those early close losses, that could have been a 50+ win team. Not a real title contender most likely, but overall, solid. But it wasn't meant to be.

DWadeno3 wrote:

Tim_Hardawayy wrote:Wade should have had more time off to recover from his offseason surgeries, but we went 0-5 in our first 5 games without him, so he rushed back. He was never right physically that year, even in the games where he played well he could barely dunk or use any lateral quickness, and was doing it purely on bball IQ and shooting.

We tried to resurrect Penny Hardaway's career with Shaq, it was cool seeing the two of them on the court together but Penny gave us next to nothing. Ricky Davis was extremely flawed as already stated. Smush Parker, Mark Blount and Chris Quinn being rotation players didn't help us any either. The Antoine Walker trade was a mistake but it was Riley doing his best at the time to try to get something, anything, to support Shaq and Zo since he hates throwing away seasons.

Then we started losing a bunch of close games even after Wade came back as stated, fell into a pretty huge hole, Zo went down to injury, and I think at that point any morale the team had was gone. Shaq got traded shortly after that, and when it became apparent Wade wasn't going to be himself without some time off to recover and we were still losing games even with Marion, the full tank was in motion.

If we don't trade Walker (still think he's a better presence than Davis/Blount combo not even considering it'd have saved us long term money), if Wade had another month or two to properly recover, if Zo doesn't have his career ending injury, if Penny actually had something left in the tank, and if we played just a bit better in a few of those early close losses, that could have been a 50+ win team. Not a real title contender most likely, but overall, solid. But it wasn't meant to be.

It's still mind-boggling that with all the bad luck we suffered that season, we ended up with Michael Beasley.

Tim_Hardawayy wrote:Wade should have had more time off to recover from his offseason surgeries, but we went 0-5 in our first 5 games without him, so he rushed back. He was never right physically that year, even in the games where he played well he could barely dunk or use any lateral quickness, and was doing it purely on bball IQ and shooting.

We tried to resurrect Penny Hardaway's career with Shaq, it was cool seeing the two of them on the court together but Penny gave us next to nothing. Ricky Davis was extremely flawed as already stated. Smush Parker, Mark Blount and Chris Quinn being rotation players didn't help us any either. The Antoine Walker trade was a mistake but it was Riley doing his best at the time to try to get something, anything, to support Shaq and Zo since he hates throwing away seasons.

Then we started losing a bunch of close games even after Wade came back as stated, fell into a pretty huge hole, Zo went down to injury, and I think at that point any morale the team had was gone. Shaq got traded shortly after that, and when it became apparent Wade wasn't going to be himself without some time off to recover and we were still losing games even with Marion, the full tank was in motion.

If we don't trade Walker (still think he's a better presence than Davis/Blount combo not even considering it'd have saved us long term money), if Wade had another month or two to properly recover, if Zo doesn't have his career ending injury, if Penny actually had something left in the tank, and if we played just a bit better in a few of those early close losses, that could have been a 50+ win team. Not a real title contender most likely, but overall, solid. But it wasn't meant to be.

Big NBA Fan wrote:But just imagine if they drafted Westbrook! Westbrook/Wade/LeBron/Bosh

SlowPaced wrote:

Big NBA Fan wrote:But just imagine if they drafted Westbrook! Westbrook/Wade/LeBron/Bosh

Hindsight is always 20/20. Westbrook at #4 was considered a reach when it happened. A lot of people thought Jerryd Bayless was the better prospect and would go higher.

Also, chain of events can change with the slighest move. The Big Three may not happen if we draft Westbrook. Because after we realized Beasley was a bust, we put all our concentration into the summer of 2010 and made moves that would free up cap space.

Big NBA Fan wrote:Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't Ira reveal that Shaq pushed for the disastrous Ricky Davis trade and was bad-mouthing Antoine behind his back, making fun of his chubby physique by calling him "Ruben Studdard?"

And then Shaq trashed Ricky after he forced his way out...I know Ricky wasn't a great player or anything, but at-least he didn't quit on the team like Shaq did.

If Shaq just stayed through the tough times- which only lasted that season - everybody would have been better off.

He would have ended his career in Miami and not become a journeyman ring-chaser and a team of:

Shaq/Wade/Chalmers/Haslem/# 2 pick would have bounced back quickly as 2009 Shaq was similar to the 2006 version (Believe it or not) and Wade was even better in 2009 than he was in 2006.

2009 Shaq averaged 18/8 on 61% shooting in only 29 MPG and was healthier and in much better shape than he was in 2006; when he missed 21 games and was sluggish due to his conditioning problems.

2009 Shaq + 2009 Wade with a solid supporting cast and a fresh start with a new head coach (Spo) would have been good.

Too bad for Shaq that he acted like such a baby and a jerk and made the terrible decision to force his way out; just like Marion was stupid to complain his way out of Phoenix because he felt he wasn't getting the respect he deserved.

I think Marion said it best a few years ago: "The trade was just bad timing for everybody involved." It didn't work out for anybody.