LeBron-Wade friendship binds Heat together

MIAMI -- The two friends ambled off the floor toward the waiting media throng. But one got there first, and so LeBron James yelled to Dwyane Wade, "Let's go!"

Wade soon joined him, sidling up to his teammate with a now unnoticed and underappreciated ease. All year, almost without exception, the co-stars powering the Miami Heat's unprecedented season have been together.

At the podium before the microphones. In the scrum after practice. In an embrace or quick exchange after games. In the locker room away from the world. In their personal lives away from the locker room.

So it was Wednesday, after the team's tune-up before heading to Philadelphia for the road portion of this opening playoff series, that the two friends faced the media's questions as a duo.

One of the first went like this: Dwayne, it's hard to believe you haven't won a playoff series since 2006 . . . "No it's not hard to believe," Wade said, correcting the questioner. "We got swept in ‘07 and then I missed a year and then two years in row we didn't have enough against the teams we went against. They were better than us. It happens."

At the heart of this question, and Wade's polite but edgy response, was the reason these two greats teamed up in the first place. To win. To win now.

Wade kept talking.

"When you're younger you think it's supposed to be (easy), but you understand in this league that it doesn't go like that," he said. "There's only a select few that are lucky enough to have success every year in the playoffs. So hopefully we can get back to that."

LeBron stood next him, saying nothing. The fact his friend was there said it all.

The most gifted basketball player on the planet, LeBron's place on this roster so resonates that it alone makes this season different.

That's been well spoken to. What hasn't been is the fact that LeBron and Wade are really and truly good friends — and that their friendship is among the most critical truths for a team that has had its every mistake, triumph, setback and victory dissected and rehashed.

"Sometimes friendship off the court is overstated," Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said Wednesday, not far from where Wade and LeBron were still standing side-by-side before the press. "I think in this case it helped. Because there was so much outside speculation and rumor and noise out there that could have easily, if they weren't friends, that could have created an environment where (it's), ‘Hey, is that true?'

"Where guys questioned real from unreal," Spoelstra added. "Early on they were able to laugh at all of it. To say, ‘That's all BS, that's not real.' "

That's doubly important because of all the things that have been real this year (and noted repeatedly in this space) that have impacted the Heat's progress: LeBron's early displays of drama and petulance in the face of so much Heat hate. Chris Bosh's awkward early attempts to fit in and, of course, play at the level expected. LeBron's early conflict with his coach.

There is a long list of problems, particularly early on, that plagued Miami.

But all the while, from then to now, there was always Wade and LeBron's friendship. It was real, and so it was a real force for change on this team.

Perhaps the most important force in the face of all the other things pressing down on them — those self-induced and those directed from the outside.

Take LeBron's early growing pains with Spoelstra. They were so pronounced, the two had to have an early conversation about the mission ahead. That's not how LeBron or his head coach would care to characterize it, but that's how it was.

On Wednesday, Spoelstra elaborated on that conversation.

"It was a reminder for both of us that we have to manage all the noise outside and keep it to what's real," Spoelstra said. "It was probably one of the steps when we started to develop a deeper trust (with each other). We were in a similar boat together, and it wasn't about us. And we needed to be able to manage that and not let it be a distraction."

LeBron and Wade had a different kind of conversation, according to people close to the situation, early in the season — one in which two stars who are close friends frankly discussed how they're going to handle sharing the spotlight.

This is no small thing. Respecting one another (see: Amar'e and ‘Melo) is not the same thing as really knowing and truly caring about one another, particularly when huge egos, millions of dollars, lasting legacies and ridiculous pressure are on the line.

"I'm sure they did, yeah," Spoelstra said. "They're close enough that they can have real conversations like that. You'd have to ask them. But I know what they talk about in our film sessions and our meetings. And those discussions would come up, ‘Oh, I'm used to this, what do you think about that.' ‘I'm used to that, I have to make an adjustment.' "

The numbers say LeBron and Wade were pretty darn successful at working it out.

LeBron's scoring has dropped slightly, from 29.7 points a game last season to 26.7 this season. His rebounds are up from 7.3 a game to 7.5, while his assists are down from 8.6 to 7.0.

Wade's scoring is down just a point a game and his assist numbers have taken a dip, but he's rebounding more than ever.

More significantly, both stars notched career highs in field-goal percentage as they created easier shots for each other.

But most Hall of Fame players will tell you the numbers get you only so far. Outside the stat sheets was a relationship that set a tone for a team, that eased stress, that developed over dinners, at practices and in private moments that no statistician would be able to track.

At the heart of this Heat season rests the friendship between LeBron James and Dwyane Wade.

Everything else took time to develop: LeBron's new and strong relationship with his head coach; Bosh's comfort level; dealing with the hate and the pressure; learning to play the kind of defense Spoelstra demands without diminishing the offensive firepower inherent to a roster with the Big Three; accepting the consequences of their actions, whether it's The Decision or contraction talk or learning to play the four (LeBron) or the five (Bosh) with vigor, success and no complaints.

But the Wade-LeBron bond has been there all along. It was the strongest seed sowed early in this season from which most everything else sprang.

"I remember there was a rumor early on about them not having a connection on the court and they weren't quite as close as people thought," Spoelstra said. "And they came in the next day after a loss and they didn't play well as a team, together, (and) all these storylines came up."

How they couldn't play together. How it would never work. How LeBron's ego couldn't share the stage with Wade's talent and how Wade's ego would never let him cede control of his team to LeBron. How theirs was an ill-fated marriage.

There was so much to criticize, rightly, in those early days. Just not the relationship between its two stars.

"They came in the next day joking about it," Spoelstra said. "‘Yeah, I guess we're not friends now — somebody should have told me that when we were at dinner last night together.'"

They laughed, apparently, and that was important, too. How great that writers and pundits were pounding out stories and quips about how LeBron and Wade didn't like one another at the exact moment LeBron and Wade were having a quiet dinner together.

It must have felt like a balm against the other criticisms, those that were all too real to be laughed off in private.

Because it is also true that, in those early days, there was a lot not to smile about.

In those early days there were pitfalls and booby traps, there were egos and anger, there was fear and uncertainty. There were many mistakes still to be made, doubts to be overcome, relationships yet to be forged.

There were many struggles that the Heat and their enablers would try to sell, time and again, as overreactions even as the team grappled with ways to overcome them.

Yet the Wade-LeBron friendship was real. It was lasting. And, as it turns out, it was a critical piece of this team's long and winding basketball journey.

You can follow Bill Reiter on Twitter.