Feeling the Heat: Wade Getting Flack for 9/11 Misquote

Controversy will follow the newly renovated Miami Heat whereever they go. No need for the team leader to go seeking it out, but that's usually what happens when you utter the phrase "World Trade Center" in the same sentence as sports.

Dwyane Wade is apologizing today for using the words "World Trade" while answering a question about the upcoming Miami Heat season. Wade used the phrase Sunday before the annual charity basketball game he co-hosts with Alonzo Mourning.

"We're going to be wearing a bull's-eye," Wade reportedly said. "But that's what you play for. We enjoy the bull's-eye. Plus, there's going to be times when we lose two, three games in a row and it seems like the world has crashed down. You all are going to make it seem like the World Trade is coming down again, but it's not going to be nothing but a couple of basketball games."

AOL FanHouse had initially reported that Wade said, "If we lose a couple in a row this season, it will be like the World Trade [Center] is coming down again."

D-Wade apologized for his choice of words, even though he probably shouldn't have to.

"I was simply trying to say that losing a few basketball games should not be compared to a real catastrophe," Wade said in a statement. "While it was certainly not my intention, I sincerely apologize to anyone who found my reference to the World Trade Center to be insensitive or offensive."

The flack should be pointed at the irresponsible reporting of AOL, not D-Wade, but leave it to New York media to twist it into a crusade against the most hated team in sports, the Miami Heat.

This is what the New York Post had to say about Wade's misquote, even after they knew he was misquoted.

"Miami's Dream Team keeps getting harder to like.

Dwyane Wade made a stupid reference to the World Trade Center yesterday when he compared the tragedy to the intense pressure on the Heat to win this season after its additions of LeBron James and Chris Bosh."

Nothing gets a New Yorker's blood boiling like the mention of 9/11, and the Big Apple's media would love nothing more to get the venom flowing toward South Beach.

D-Wade wasn't saying that he felt if his new team of super friends lost, they would become an al Qaeda target. He was saying the media and fans would blow it out of proportion.

Accurate? Yes. But at the same time, Wade may have learned the most valuable lesson he will this season.

The Heat are the hated and the hunted. Anything he says or LeBron says or Bosh says or the towel boy says will become fuel for the hate machine.

Here's a few phrases to stay away from: "World Trade Center;" "We're ready to go to war like Afghanistan;" or the popular "We are going to drop a Hiroshima bomb on other teams.

Wade will likely be the mouth piece for the Three Kings and for his own sake, it might be best if he let his play on the court do the talking.

Copyright Associated Press / NBC 6 Miami

Leave Comments