When Bradley Beal requested a trade from the Washington Wizards, he wanted to get traded to the Miami Heat. The NBA star was able to control his trade request since he had a no-trade clause in his contract, but the Heat weren’t able to make a deal happen, so Beal was traded to the Phoenix Suns.
“So, my initial favorite was Miami,” Beal wrote in a diary for Andscape. “And so, we call Miami. [Miami president] Pat [Riley] says well I’ll go talk to [owner] Micky [Arison] and figure it out. So he goes, talks to Micky, we go, we hear back [New York] Knicks, Sacramento, Brooklyn a little bit, and then it was Milwaukee and it was one more big team … And that was kind of one of the most difficult things about every trade and every team. And I respect and love every team, but a lot of them just couldn’t do it because the money was just so high.”
Beal wound up waiving his no-trade clause for the Suns, who traded Chris Paul and Landry Shamet to the Wizards. Phoenix now has a dangerous Big 3 in Beal, Kevin Durant and Devin Booker.
“I’m like, ‘OK, what’s Miami doing? Dragging feet.’ And eventually it came to a point to where Miami said they just can’t do it,” Beal wrote. “But it was an eye-opener for sure. And that’s why I said I went into everything kind of open-minded and with an open slate. And out of nowhere here comes a dark horse in Phoenix and their aggressiveness pushed me over the top.”
Beal averaged 23.2 points, 3.9 rebounds and 5.4 assists for the Wizards last season. The three-time All-Star will start in Phoenix alongside Booker, Durant, Jusuf Nurkic and Josh Okogie.