And so it ends, not with an on-court celebration or civic coronation, but the clashing of swords and tersely worded reports Dwyane Wade was taking his talents to Chicago.
Gone?
Gone.
The Heat, folks, are in full rebuild mode, both on the court and off it. On the court, they're down to six veterans under contract and one of them, Chris Bosh, is a question mark to ever play again. Fasten your seat belts. Rough season ahead.
Off the court, the curtain has been yanked back on "family" and "trust," and "Heat Lifer" and every other mythological underpinning of a blue-ribbon franchise to the point its in an uncomfortable predicament today and for its immediate tomorrows.
It's tough when Heat fans are asked to choose sides between Wade, who made a business decision to take millions more from Chicago, and Heat owner Micky Arison and president Pat Riley, who made the business decision to hold the line from an aging legend.
It's tougher still knowing the behind-the-scenes bile that flowed in the final hours between both sides. Leaked negotiations? Revisionist relationships? And either the narrative Wade's a petulant diva (the Heat's take) or that the franchise regularly shortchanged its shining symbol of family (Wade's side)?
Bad times, man. Bad times.
And what makes it all the worse is how empty and exposed the Heat's shining ideals of sacrifice, trust and love _ yes, even love _ look today, as if they were convenient crutches in good times more than the truth in rocky times.
Some will be made at Wade. Too greedy, they'll say. Too demanding. But everyone embraced the 2010 story of Wade calling Bosh and LeBron James and asking them to shave $15 million off their contracts to keep "Heat Lifer" Udonis Haslem.
Wade, after all, took $17 million off his contract. Haslem cried. "I'll always love you, man," he texted. Didn't all Heat fans think the same?
But now that Wade has left "The Family" some people will wonder why he didn't just keep sacrificing money. Here's a question: Would you continually sacrifice money for your company? Without becoming upset?
That's not to say the Heat were wrong here. Not at all. Their original offer of two years and $40 million to Wade seemed fair by all the normal ideas of negotiation and salary-cap limitations.
These aren't normal times, though. The market exploded in recent days as the salary cap jumped to $94 million. Money was thrown everywhere. Average players became rich.
For the first time in his career, Wade demanded to get maximum dollar. Nothing wrong with that. The Heat, in return, told Wade paying him that much made no sense. Nothing wrong with that, either.
So the Heat will have untold millions _ $50 million, $60 million? _ next summer when free agency comes to try and rebuild their team if Bosh doesn't return to the court or return to the Heat.
There's no reason for him to come back here now. This team can fail just as easily without him. They're headed for the draft lottery, a sinking ship that can only refuel a year from now.
And Wade? What becomes of him? He'll be cast in a darker light for a while, as well as the Dark Lord himself, LeBron, who helped counsel him there.
Some might even say Wade has lost his future standing with the Heat, that he'll never stand in a corporate suit one day between Riley and team legend Alonzo Mourning.
This, of course, is reacting too hard. The good times aren't always lasting ones. Riley, for instance, met with Los Angeles Lakers' owner Jerry Buss back in 2006 and proposed a return to his one-time franchise as general manager.
He'd broker a peace between Kobe Bryant and Shaquille O'Neal. He'd bring back winning ways to the Lakers. Or does everyone neglect to remember that chapter?
And Mourning? He did exactly what Wade is doing. He went for the bigger money of the New Jersey Nets when the Heat wouldn't give it. The Heat brass hissed over his disloyalty considering they suffered with him through his kidney disease and transplant.
You see, things aren't always so rosy inside "The Family," just as they aren't in any family. And the only ones surprised by it are the ones naive enough to buy into the myth in the first place.
This was business between Wade and the Heat. Big, unwieldy, complicated business between big, fascinating and competitive egos. And if it's fun to tout Disney themes and forever love in the good times, there's an equal and opposite truth about careers being marriages of corporate convenience and selfish needs.
Wade did what many people do. He maximized his dollars. Again, nothing wrong with that. The Heat didn't want to pay him. Again, that's their right.
But it's a bad day, the day the best South Florida athlete in this generation is gone, the day a proud franchise's ideals of trust, sacrifice and family looks as empty as this season will be.
