Dwyane Wade crashes to the ground more than a two-year-old on a playground. He flies into the lane and plays with a reckless abandon that means he ends up crashing to the ground, a lot. Which means a lot of bumps and bruises. And he plays through them.
So when he says the pain from a thigh bruise suffered Sunday is “a 9.7 on a scale of 10,” as he told our man Ira Winderman at the Sun Sentinel, then you take him seriously.
He himself says he is questionable for Wednesday against the Bucks. After that it is Friday against the Bobcats and Sunday is a potential second round playoff preview game against the Celtics.“I’m just going to take it a day at a time,” he said. “I’m going to do my treatment, my therapy and see how I feel on Wednesday. If I feel I can go, I’ll go. If I feel like I’m going to hurt myself even more and hurt my team, I’ll wait.”
Teammate LeBron James said there should be no rush.
“He knows at this point he doesn’t have to push it,” James said. “We need him more later than we do now.”
The Heat want the two seed (they are in a virtual tie with Boston for that now, both with 23 losses), but having Wade not battling a lingering thigh issue in the playoffs would matter more. A lot more.
He’ll probably want to play Wednesday but don’t be shocked if the team tells him to get some rest. Still, this is Wade, so don’t expect him to sit out long.