As the Miami Heat waits on a resolution to the Kevin Durant sweepstakes, veteran guard Alec Burks will soon be working toward finding a resolution to his uncertain NBA future.
Burks, who will be an unrestricted free agent this offseason after proving to be a helpful veteran in his first season with the Heat this past season, hopes to strike a deal to return to Miami. He signed a one-year veteran minimum contract with the Heat last summer and again will likely need to settle for a minimum deal to re-sign with the Heat this summer.
“The only thing I’m looking at is coming back here,” Burks said of his desire to return to the Heat in free agency during a Tuesday appearance to interact and take photos with young campers at Jr. Heat Basketball Camp at Cooper City High School. “Everything else is what it is.”Burks, who turns 34 on July 20, can begin negotiating a potential new deal with the Heat as early as Friday if the Oklahoma City Thunder — now up 3-2 in the best-of-7 series — closes out the Indiana Pacers in Game 6 of the NBA Finals on Thursday night to win the championship. That’s because the Heat and other NBA teams can begin negotiating with their own impending free agents on the day after the last game of the NBA Finals.
“I hope so,” Burks said when asked if there’s a chance he could agree to a new deal with the Heat ahead of the June 30 start of league-wide free agent negotiations. “Let’s put that in the air.”
Why does Burks want to return to the Heat after playing for eight different teams through his first 14 NBA seasons?“I just like being here,” Burks said Tuesday. “I like the city. The city shows me a lot of love and my family, I like the organization, everybody I work with. It’s just a great place to be for this stage of my career. I like being here.”
But the focus of the NBA world is on Durant, who is expected to be traded by the Phoenix Suns in the coming days. The Heat, San Antonio Spurs and Houston Rockets are Durant’s three preferred trade destinations, according to ESPN’s Shams Charania.
Charania also reported Monday that the Minnesota Timberwolves have been engaged with the Suns on a potential Durant trade, but Durant “has no desire to be in Minnesota with the Timberwolves.”
This is important because Durant has just one season left on his contract, as he’s due $54.7 million next season before he can become a free agent in the 2026 offseason
