Three-time NBA champion Dwyane Wade has bought a stake in the Utah Jazz and joined Ryan Smith, with majority owner and team governor, and plans to take an active role in the franchise and region.
Wade, an eight-time All-NBA player at the Miami Heat, is the youngest of several players on the Hall of Fame level with NBA ownership, including Grant Hill (Atlanta Hawks), Shaquille O’Neal (Sacramento Kings) and Charlotte Hornets. majority owner Michael Jordan. Magic Johnson previously had a 4% stake in the Los Angeles Lakers.
“It goes far beyond the dream that I just had to play basketball in the NBA,” Wade told ESPN. “I saw Shaq do it in Sacramento. I saw Grant Hill do it in Atlanta. I saw Jordan do it in Charlotte. If this partnership is going to be something like my relationship with Ryan, there’s going to be a lot of things going on. be what I want to be involved in ….
“Unfortunately, people in my community do not get this opportunity, and I do not take it lightly to get this opportunity. To make real change, this is where you need to be – at the top – and Ryan knows it. I is grateful to him, and I also know that I bring a lot to this partnership just my basketball knowledge and skills. ‘
Wade, 39, met Smith at a golf course in San Clemente, California, shortly after retiring from the game in 2019, and they quickly became friends. Wade wanted to understand Smith’s technology empire, including his company Qualtrics, and called him a mentor. Smith, 42, sparked the idea that Wade would join the ownership group after completing a $ 1.66 billion purchase of the Jazz in October.
The NBA has an ordinance that ownership interest can be no less than 1% of the team, but Wade’s financial investment in the franchise is not immediately clear.
Wade joins a small group of owners that includes Smith and his wife, Ashley; investor and Accel partner Ryan Sweeney; Mike Cannon-Brookes, co-founder of Atlassian; and the Miller family, who previously owned the team.
“Dwyane had the chance to be part of so many different [ownership] groups if he wanted to, ‘Smith told ESPN. We’ve basically been in the discussion since we closed the team on how we can do that. As I run my tech business, you want the brightest people.
“There’s a big picture here. It’s much more than just basketball. This league is the biggest platform out there, and we ran there. It’s not a league where we said, ‘Hey, it’s somewhere. “We’re not comfortable with that.” “That’s actually what we signed up for. We’re the newest ownership group. We’re the youngest. Dwyane fits perfectly.
“It was not like we wanted more partners; that was not what we were trying to do. I want to work with Dwyane on and off the court, on the business side, and so do our partners – because of whom he “is like a human being and what he has achieved. These are the kind of people you want.”
Wade did not say whether he had important talks with Heat ownership over a financial stake in the franchise where he spent 14 seasons of his career. He describes his strong personal relationship with Smith and a shared vision for the business partnership as the driving force for securing the Jazz interest.
‘The respect I have for it [Heat] organization will go nowhere, the love I have for the [Heat] fans – it’s not going anywhere, “Wade told ESPN. But it’s about the next phase of my life as an investor, a businessman, an entrepreneur. For me, it’s an opportunity to grow. ‘
Heat Owner Micky Arison on Twitter expressed disappointment that Wade had not reconsidered an interest in the Miami franchise after previous negotiations, adding that he wanted Wade “strength and lots of success with the Jazz. “
Wade described a synergy with Smith’s progressive vision to transform the success of Jazz on the track – including a leading 41-14 record – into becoming a cultural leader in the community and state. In addition to Smith’s lifelong love of jazz and basketball, his dedication to social affairs easily sold the organization to Wade. Smith awarded a four-year college scholarship to an underserved student for every Jazz win this season and, along with Apple CEO Tim Cook, invested $ 4 million in the construction of eight Encircle homes, providing safe haven. for LGBTQ youth and their families. . Smith embraced the Black Lives Matter movement and supported his players in public.
“We are not running away from the racial and social and LGBTQ talks,” Wade told ESPN. “I’m committed to doing the work. I’m talking about the LGBTQ community, which everyone knows is important to me. My daughter is part of the community.
“I don’t just see it as a Utah Jazz relationship. I see it as a multiple relationship – business, basketball, to be able to bring Ryan into my world just as he brings me into his world.”
Wade has had a strong relationship with Jazz All-Star guard Donovan Mitchell, who has been regularly compared to Wade since his arrival in the NBA.
“I call him 2.0,” Wade told ESPN. “If there’s one player like me, it’s Donovan Mitchell.”
Prior to the coronavirus pandemic, Mitchell spent time shadowing Wade in South Florida.
“He wanted to ride in the car with me, go to the gym and shoot, and really wanted to pick my brain,” Wade said. ‘He’s on the short list of people who call me and talk for hours. We have a big brother-little-brother relationship. ‘
This relationship will have the opportunity to grow, as will the role of Wade on the basketball side of the Jazz. Wade sees ‘they have the right people in place’ and sees the opportunity to choose his places to make a contribution on the team’s side.
From free agent meetings to individual attorneys, Wade said he is fully invested in the future of the franchise. Wade, wife Gabrielle Union and family live in Los Angeles, a short flight from Utah. They went skiing in Park City on Valentine’s Day. “I fell on my ass many times,” Wade said. “Ryan shows us every inch of Utah.”
Smith said: “Every city in every state looks to leaders in their community to help. Whether it’s Minnesota, New York or LA, what we do can be used to cultivate the culture of an entire [region]. This is the work that Dwyane and our group are talking about. We are in a world where basketball unites this state as everything else in the world tries to divide us. If we can take the platform and do good and lead and write change for the future, we can look back and say, ‘Wow, that’s what the legacy is about.’