Miami Heat and NBA legend Dwyane Wade had an amazing career in the league. In his 16-year career, he won not only individual accolades but was part of three NBA Championship teams.
While Wade certainly played a vital role in winning the said championships, he also had great support in his career. In his first NBA Championship team, he had the support of none other than Shaquille O’Neal. While Shaq’s best years might have been behind him at that point, he was still a phenomenal player.
As for his other two championships, he had partnered up with LeBron James and Chris Bosh to form the Miami Heat’s Big 3. That team went to four straight NBA Finals and won two of them.
Keeping these achievements in mind, many fans regard him as one of the best shooting guards to play in the league. Well, not everyone seems to agree to it. We are talking about NBA Hall of Famer Paul Pierce.
After retiring from the league in 2017, Pierce started the second innings of his life as an NBA analyst. And let’s be honest he wasn’t as good at it as he was at playing basketball. One of his most infamous takes was about labeling himself a better player than D-Wade. Pierce made these claims in 2019 on ESPN as he said:
“That’s easy! I can say that off the bat. That’s me. If you give me Shaq, if you give me LeBron … If you give me these guys earlier in my career … When I was 24 years old, if you give me Shaq. When I’m 24 or 25 you give me LeBron and Bosh, I’d be sitting on five or six championships. Easy.”
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At the time, Pierce received a lot of backlash from NBA fans for making these claims. However, D-Wade gave a classy response to these claims by Pierce, which won the hearts of the fans.
So regardless of what Pierce said in 2019, most fans still believe that D-Wade had a better career than Pierce. And in my opinion, those fans are correct.
