Ira Winderman: LeBron keeps Heat in a holding pattern? That has a familiar ring to it.
· Yahoo Sports
MIAMI — Two weeks ago, the concerns for the Miami Heat were about a potential extended waiting game with Giannis Antetokounmpo. Those concerns were allayed in the late hours on July 23, with the Milwaukee Bucks agreeing to move their All-Star forward to the Heat.
Now, the patience being tested moves to another front, as the Heat, and several other potential suitors, find themselves waiting out the free-agency decision of LeBron James.
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In an interview with Forbes, agent Rich Paul said the process will play out on James’ timetable — and only on his client’s timetable.
“I don’t think this happens anytime soon,” Paul said in the interview posted Saturday. “I don’t think it’ll be the next few days.”
Without offering a hint of when.
“I’m on his schedule,” Paul said. “I can’t tell the man how fast to move. When he’s telling me what he’s deciding, that’s when I’ll let you guys know.”
The Heat very much have been here before, waiting out James in 2014 free agency. That drama played out without resolution until July 11 of that summer, before the future Hall of Famer moved on from the Heat back to his hometown Cleveland Cavaliers.
A move home to Cleveland again could be the resolution. Or not.
And that again has created a holding pattern throughout the NBA, hardly the best of timing with the league’s 2026-27 signing period opening at noon Monday.
Paul said it would be inaccurate to compare this situation to when his client left the Heat for the Cavaliers in 2014.
“This is the first time he’s making a decision that is truly for him. There is no pressure,” Paul said. “When he left Cleveland, he had to win a ring. When he came back, he had to deliver on the promise. This is at this stage where he can decide what he wants to do and how he wants to do it.”
Waiting games, of course, are nothing new for Pat Riley, Andy Elisburg and the Heat front office, who effectively were put on hold by the Portland Trail Blazers front office for the entire 2023 offseason, before prime trade target Damian Lillard instead was sent to the Bucks on Sept. 27 that year.
Unlike the Heat’s waiting game with James in 2014, the Heat’s 2026-27 roster this time is largely set, with the acquisitions of Antetokounmpo and Bobby Portis to be made official Monday, as will be the free-agent signing of Tim Hardaway Jr.
However, agent Rich Paul lists Miami among his client’s potential landing spots, so there is a degree of the James waiting game being revisited.
Coming off their fourth consecutive trip to the NBA Finals a month earlier in 2014, the waiting game and ultimate rejection by James created quite the scramble for the Heat front office.
In the days after what effectively stood as The Decision 2.0 in 2014, the Heat signed free agents Danny Granger, Josh McRoberts and Luol Deng and re-signed Dwyane Wade, Chris Bosh, Udonis Haslem and Chris Andersen.
This time, there won’t be quite the same frenzy, if the Heat wait at all.
Even before James acknowledged a week ago that he would not be returning to the Los Angeles Lakers, he hinted on his "Mind of the Game" podcast in May that his decision process could go well into the offseason as he mulls a direction for a 24th season.
“I think at some point up in June, late June, as July rolls around, free agency starts to get going, and as July’s rolling maybe into August, we start to kind of like get a feel of what my future may look like,” he said to podcast co-host Steve Nash.
“Winning is most important. You want to be excited about, like I said earlier, winning the day and being around a group of guys that feel the same way. I’m not going anywhere where it’s a start over at year 24.”
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