Although Chris Bosh pledged this weekend to continue working toward a comeback after his latest health setback, it doesn’t appear as though he’ll return to the Heat. Team president Pat Riley said today that the Heat are no longer anticipating Bosh to get back on the court for the franchise, according to Ira Winderman of The South Florida Sun Sentinel.
“I think Chris is still open-minded. But we are not working toward his return,” Riley said. “We feel that, based on the last exam, that his Heat career is probably over.”
Asked whether or not he feels that Bosh’s NBA career is also over, Riley suggested “that’s up to him,” according to Winderman. The veteran big man has had to deal with blood-clotting issues and failed a recent physical with the Heat, whose doctors weren’t comfortable clearing him to play.
Riley and Bosh’s camp have disagreed on how much support the team has provided the 11-time All-Star as he has dealt with his health issues. While Riley says the Heat have worked hard to help Bosh get back on the court, Bosh’s camp says he received little help from the team, and had to find his own doctor to get a program that would allow him to play, per Barry Jackson of The Miami Herald (Twitter links). Riley and Bosh reportedly haven’t spoken in months — Riley said today that he has reached out to Bosh, but didn’t receive a reply, tweets Ethan J. Skolnick of The Miami Herald.
“His health, playing and economics — it’s been health, health, health,” Riley said today. “Whatever the cap ramifications are, they are there, but we never ever thought about that. … Contrary to how this thing has been perpetuated in the media, we have worked very, very hard with Chris. We headed down the road very excited to a point where we thought it would work. And then the physical couldn’t clear him to the next step.”
The Heat would have multiple options to increase their cap flexibility if Bosh is unable to return to the court this year. Miami could apply for a disabled player exception worth about $5.6MM that would allow the team to sign or trade a player for no more than that amount. Alternately, as of February 9, the club could potentially remove Bosh’s remaining cap hits from its books if a doctor jointly approved by the NBA and the NBPA rules him medically unable to return.
It’s ashamed just think 5years ago wade;LeBron;bosh gave south Florida so much hope and then LeBron pulled rug from underneath all of South Florida and never looked back except to come here and work out ;its as if they never won 2 rings ;LeBron only cares about the ring he just won boy he did a number on the franchise and south Florida now Wade gone ; bosh not healthy and LeBron took his talent to the cav,s WOW!!
75 million dollars is a lot of money. Would the Heat pressure their medical staff to declare Bosh’s condition a barrier to his playing so they could clear the money from their salary cap? Some people think so and clearly Bosh suspects as much. But the Heat did not rely sole on their own medical staff. They sent Bosh to New York for a battery of tests by specialists and the hard evidence is Bosh has multiple clots in his lungs which, like 18 months ago poses a life threatening risk to him. Bosh claims to have found one doctor who was comfortable clearing him to play based on two prior episodes of clotting. But, significantly, Bosh never revealed if that doctor was aware that a third recurrance of clotting has occured. Medical text books tell you that two instances of blook clots in a year mean a third is highly likely and that in Bosh’s case is exactly what happened. So how likely is a fourth? Don’t ask. In the meantime, the Hockey player Bosh repeatedly cited as playing with blood clots while taking blood thinners? He failed his physical this week.