It was pretty much a given that Dwyane Wade was going to accept a $23.8 million player option for the 2017-18 season to remain with the Bulls. Since he’s going to be back and buyout rumors have been shot down by the Bulls front office, let’s discuss Wade’s role for next season.
The nail in the coffin for Dwyane Wade leaving Chicago after just one season was supposed to be the trade that sent three-time All-Star Jimmy Butler to the Minnesota Timberwolves. Wade, who battled injuries and struggled throughout most of the 2016-17 season in his first season away from Miami, was given a player option in his contract he signed last summer that stunned the NBA community after 13 seasons with the Heat.
Once Butler was traded and Rajon Rondo was waived, the “Three Alphas” project was officially dead and the assumption was that Wade would look for a new home after coming back to his hometown last summer. But, with a $23.8 million player option staring him right in the face, it was a no-brainer for Wade to accept the option and line his pockets.
That brings the question of what Wade’s role is next season. The Bulls have three point guards on their roster in Kris Dunn (acquired in the Butler trade), Jerian Grant (acquired in the Derrick Rose trade) and Cameron Payne. Along with the three-headed cluster at point guard, the Bulls have Wade, former first-round pick Denzel Valentine, Justin Holiday and David Nwaba.
That’s seven players for two backcourt positions, not even mentioning the fact that Zach LaVine will be returning to play at some point after the season gets going.
“I’m excited about what the environment in this building is going to be like going forward,” John Paxson said at the introductory press conference for the new faces after the Butler trade. “I’m not worried about perception. We understand this could take time, it’s a process. But as long as these kids can play hard and compete our fans will appreciate them, and we’ll get better.”
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Throughout this process of transitioning from a successful era of Bulls basketball with Tom Thibodeau at the helm to the current era of Fred Hoiberg and the youth movement, the focus from Paxson and Bulls general manager Gar Forman has been about seeing what their young players can do. Dwyane Wade is obviously not one of those young players. His career is coming to a close and although he’s being played like a superstar, he’s far from those days as “The Flash”.
Although Wade will help the Bulls sell plenty of tickets, jerseys and will help the franchise please some sponsors because money always talks, him playing starter’s minutes does the Bulls no good moving forward into this rebuilding phase that kicked off after the Butler trade was made official. If the focus for the Chicago Bulls is to “see what the kids can do”, then playing Wade 30+ minutes a night is redundant and stunting the progress that the younger players on the roster can make with more minutes on the floor for a bad team.
The writing’s been on the wall for Wade and his career since the 2012-13 season. Since he played 34.7 minutes per game with the world champion Miami Heat at the time, Wade’s minutes have decreased down to just 29.9 per contest last season. His shooting percentage has plummeted from 52.1 percent in ’12-13 to just 43.4 percent in 60 games last season with the Bulls.
It’s not a secret that Wade’s career is going to over soon, but it’s also not a secret that he’s not a plus player anymore. His offensive rating of 107 (10th-best on the Bulls roster) was actually one less than Nikola Mirotic‘s offensive rating of 108 last year and Mirotic became public enemy No. 1 to many Bulls fans last season with his inconsistent play offensively. Mirotic is 25. Wade is 35. There’s room for Mirotic to still potentially grow in the NBA. Wade’s career is practically over.
Next: Breaking down the Bulls' options at small forward this season
If what Forman and Paxson have been saying about wanting to see more action for the younger players they’ve brought in over the last couple of summers, then Wade simply just doesn’t fit the role of “heavy-minute rotation player”.
The Bulls aren’t winning any games anyway, so playing a 35-year-old whose been past his prime for 4-5 years isn’t a bad idea for draft positioning of course, but in terms of progression from potential core guys in the future, playing Wade starter minutes shouldn’t be in the cards this season.