Dwyane Wade will lead the league in steals next season.
OK, well, maybe he won’t finish No. 1. But plan on Wade averaging about 2.5 steals per game, which would be a career best, and being one of the season’s most disruptive defensive forces.
The Heat would love for Wade to be a lockdown defender such as Kobe Bryant. And Wade would love that, too. However, steals are probably more realistic next season. The Olympics gave a taste of the boost a healthy Wade can provide when gambling for steals. Plus, once again he’ll need most of his energy for late-game offense.
Wade has already averaged 2.0 steals in a season twice (2.0 in 2005-06 and 2.1 in 2006-07).
The big difference this season is Wade won’t have Shaq or Zo (at least not for the first part of the season) behind him to clean up mistakes with sheer mass, hard fouls or blocks.
Nevertheless, plan on the steals, and not lockdown defense, to be Wade’s new threat this season. And that’s not a bad thing.
As for Wade averaging 2.5 steals per game, that total would have been No. 2 last season behind Chris Paul (2.7 steals per game) and ahead of Ron Artest (2.3).
