DWYANE WADE
Congratulations, Dwyane Wade!!!
You are the 2005-06 BEST DAMN GUARD.
Wade, age 24, is the inaugural Best Damn Guard winner. At 6-foot-4, D-Wade averaged a spectular 34.7 ppg in the Finals, including a whopping 40.3 ppg in the Heat’s three home games. In Miami’s series-clinching Game 6 victory over Dallas, Wade poured in 36 points, including 11 in the 4th quarter. Dwyane hit 10 of his 18 shots while making 16 of 21 free throws.
It was a pleasure watching D-Wade “take it to the rack” this season. As the “first-ever” recipient of the Best Damn Guard award, Wade is now granted induction into the guard’s wing of the honorary but fictitious Pantheon of NBA Greats. By capturing the Finals MVP, as well as the Best Damn Guard title, Wade has secured his place alongside the truly great guards to ever play the beautiful game of NBA basketball.
The Best Damn Guard series began at the outset of the 05-06 playoffs with the bold prediction that the NBA’s best all-around guard would not only prove himself so, but he would ultimately lead his team to the 2006 NBA Championship.
Second, this series began under the expressed premise that Dwyane Wade is the best all-around guard in the NBA and therefore, the Miami Heat would become 05-06 NBA Champions.
Wade is now granted immunity throughout all of next season. He will reign atop the Best Damn Guard board until another guard unseats him during the 2006-07 playoffs, unless he retains his crown.
Having studied the game’s guards the entire regular season, this experiment was equal parts empiricism, faith, humility, instinct, and trust — trust in the work being put in, and trust in the data being churned out game-by-game, and via the BEST DAMN GUARD board during the playoffs.
Photo: Andrew D. Bernstein/NBAE/Getty Images
BEST DAMN GUARD © 2006. All Rights Reserved.