Sources: Heat offer Dwyane Wade a two-year, $40 million deal
The Miami Heat have offered Dwyane Wade a two-year, $40 million contract, according to league sources.
Despite that offer, a source told ESPN's Ramona Shelburne that the two sides are at "a bit of an impasse," with the Heat remaining optimistic that the two sides will get a deal done.
Reports that the Heat offered Wade only $10 million for next season have been overblown, sources said, with the sides actually being $10 million apart on the total amount of the contract.
According to sources, Wade's current offer from the Heat was always part of a contingency for both sides to consider within the parameters of a deal based on Miami's other free-agency efforts to re-sign center Hassan Whiteside and pursue Kevin Durant. The Heat agreed to a four-year, $98 million deal with Whiteside on the opening day of free-agency recruiting Friday, and Durant agreed to a two-year, $54 million deal to leave Oklahoma City for Golden State on Monday.
Wade is hoping for a longer deal or more than the $20 million he made last year if he is to accept a two-year deal, a source told Shelburne. Wade, sources told ESPN, continues to draw interest from the Denver Nuggets and Milwaukee Bucks. However, on Tuesday, sources told ESPN's Brian Windhorst that Wade canceled some free agent meetings, including with the Bucks.
Although the belief leaguewide remains that the Heat and Wade will find a resolution, as they always have, sources told ESPN that both Denver and Milwaukee are hanging around in case Wade decides it's time to leave the only franchise he has ever played for. Over the years, Wade has twice taken pay cuts to help the Heat manage their salary cap, and he has taken short-term deals to help the team with flexibility. He signed one-year contracts each of the past two summers.
"I hope that everything is quiet and works out the way I want it to," Wade said in his exit interview in May. "But I have no control over that, as much as people might think. It's a lot of moving parts in free agency. I'm not worried about it. I'm not getting into how many years I want to play. Just because I sign a contract doesn't mean it's going to be it, that I'm going to play that contract out. The contract I look to sign this summer is something I hope I'm comfortable with."
Wade, who has spent his entire 13-season career in Miami, averaged 19.0 points, 4.6 assists and 4.1 rebounds this past season, and he was an All-Star for the 12th time.
Information from ESPN's Marc Stein, Brian Windhorst and Ramona Shelburne was used in this report.
