Dwyane Wade signs £36.2million deal with Chicago Bulls after 13 years at Miami Heat

Dwyane Wade is going home, making what he called 'an extremely emotional and tough decision' on Wednesday night to leave the Miami Heat after 13 seasons and sign with the Chicago Bulls.

Wade, 34, will sign a two-year deal with the Bulls, one that will pay him about $47million (£36.2m).

Miami offered $40m (£30.8) over two years for Wade to stay in the uniform that he's worn his entire career, the one in which he was an All-Star 12 times, a champion three times and the NBA Finals MVP in 2006 when his rise to superstardom was just truly beginning. 

'This was not an easy decision, but I feel I have made the right choice for myself and my family,' Wade wrote in a letter to Miami.

It ends a second consecutive summer of will-he-or-won't-he talk and worry in Miami, which was able to keep him last summer after contentious negotiations led to a $20m (£15.4m), one-year deal.

The Heat spoke with him on Wednesday in New York in an effort to keep him, the same day that Wade also took meetings with the Milwaukee Bucks and the Denver Nuggets.

Whether Chicago ever got into the same room with Wade was unclear on Wednesday night. What was clear was that whatever the Bulls said, and however they said it, was enough to get him out of Miami this time, after they missed on him twice before.

And even more clear was that the lure of home - just as it was for Wade's close friend LeBron James two years ago, when he left Miami to go back to north east Ohio and rejoin the Cleveland Cavaliers - was too strong this time to ignore.

'Watching the Bulls growing up inspired me at an early age to pursue my dream of becoming a basketball player,' Wade wrote in the letter.

'I have never forgotten where I came from and I am thankful to have an opportunity to play for the team that first fueled my love of the game.'

He was beloved in South Florida, where the county was even once renamed 'Miami-Wade County' instead of Miami-Dade for a time in 2010 during the summer when Wade managed to convince Chris Bosh and James to join him and build a team that would go to the NBA Finals four consecutive times.

His jersey has been one of the NBA's biggest sellers for years, even though he never changed cities or numbers. It was always Heat on the front, 3 on the back.

The Bulls sent guard Jose Calderon and two future second-round picks to the Los Angeles Lakers in exchange for the rights to an undetermined player who isn't currently in the NBA, and also traded Mike Dunleavy to the Cleveland Cavaliers.

Both trades were confirmed on condition of anonymity because they were not immediately finalised.