Miami Heat Unveils Dwyane Wade Statue That Confuses, Angers Fans

After seeing the statue, people are asking for a redo.

The Miami Heat unveiled a bronze statue of the “greatest player in Miami Heat” history, Dwyane Wade, over the weekend, the first player in franchise history to receive such an honor.

“This is crazy,” he said after the statue was revealed outside of the Heat’s arena. “I wanted to feel this. Life goes by so fast, and it’s very rare that we get to feel things because we’re always off to the next thing. I wanted to feel this, man. I wanted to look at it.”

The celebration of Wade and the bronze statue will continue on Oct. 28 when the Heat hosts the Detroit Pistons at Kaseya Center. This is the 21st anniversary of Wade’s debut with the Heat.

More permanent than the 🔑 under the mat pic.twitter.com/Z6rPHKPNaa

— Miami HEAT (@MiamiHEAT) October 27, 2024

The statue was done by Rotblatt Amrany Studio sculptors Omri Amrany and Oscar León. The pair was also responsible for the “Michael Jordan Spirit” in Chicago, the Kobe Bryant “Black Mamba” statue, and the “Kobe and Gianna Bryant Memorial Statue” in Los Angeles.

But many observers felt the statue looked nothing like the Heat legend, and made their thoughts known on social media.

I’m sorry, but that statute is horrible. Disrespectful to D-Wade.

— Steven Valdez II (@StevenValdezII1) October 27, 2024

Omg, I’m sorry but that looks nothing like @DwyaneWade.

Who designed this?

— Eric Mizrachi (@EricMizrachi) October 28, 2024

Did anyone look at the statue before hand? That is not wade 🤣🤣🤣

— Shred 👨‍🍳 (@Shred_) October 28, 2024

They sent the wrong picture to the sculptor… pic.twitter.com/5qelpf1UfL

— Alex (@adcr24) October 28, 2024

You gotta make this right. I mean come on. Do we need to start a @Change petition? pic.twitter.com/VNqRhsTrRg

— Kelly✡️🎗️💙 (@namasteliving) October 28, 2024

Wade appeared in 1,054 regular season games, averaging 22.0 points, 5.4 assists, 4.7 rebounds, 1.54 steals, and 33.9 minutes. He is one of only three players in NBA history to score at least 20,000,5,000 assists, 4,000 rebounds, 1,500 steals, 800 blocks, and 500 three-point field goals made. The other two are LeBron James and Michael Jordan.