Wade thinks injuries stopped him from being as good as LeBron

Whenever he decides to hang 'em up, there will be no denying Dwyane Wade's place as a first ballot Hall of Famer and one of the greatest shooting guards of all time.

Still, one can't help but wonder how much more impressive Wade's resume would be had his career not been derailed by a slew of injuries - Wade missed 187 games over his first 12 seasons - most notably multiple knee surgeries and shoulder surgery.

Wade himself thinks about the possibilities, he told ESPN's Scoop Jackson in an introspective one-on-one focusing on Flash's legacy.

"Hell yeah!" Wade said when asked if what those injuries did to his career bothers him.

"I looked at Michael Jordan's career and LeBron's career. Now Kobe's career is still amazing with all of the injuries he's had, but I look at Jordan and LeBron and I'm like, they didn't have to deal with many injuries," Wade told Jackson. "So yeah, I look at it like: If I didn't have those injuries, if I was equally as healthy throughout my career as say LeBron's been, my career would probably be equally as great."

While it's easy to dismiss Wade's claims at first glance, keep in mind that at his absolute best, the 6-foot-4 guard was able to do things on the court that few, if any, players have been able to accomplish at that size.

The 12-time All-Star, who is slated to start this year's game in Toronto, has a scoring title, three championships, and a Finals MVP to his name after putting together one of the finest Finals performances in league history in 2006.

In addition, Wade is one of only eight players to ever produce a 30 PER season, and is the only player in history 6-foot-5 or shorter to record 700 blocks.

At the end of the day, that physical pounding at Wade's size is probably what led to his body slowly betraying him. But don't scoff at the fact that a healthy Wade might have gone down as one of the absolute greats.