RIO DE JANIERO, Brazil -- The Miami Heat and Cleveland Cavaliers are staying about a mile apart on nearby beaches while in Rio. There are three former Heat players, namely LeBron James, plus several former Heat staff members who are now with the Cavs. There's a former Cavs player on the Heat, Luol Deng.
But as far as their social calendars go this week in Brazil, they might as well be on separate coasts.
Perhaps members of the opposing delegations will run into each other at a restaurant, club or tourist attraction. But it sure sounds like any such fraternization would be by chance. For as much as the players on both sides want to downplay it, there's no missing the chill running between these two teams right now.
"We're trying to build our chemistry with our team," Dwyane Wade said. "So the little time we have, we're trying to focus on the Miami Heat."
"It's going to be special to see those guys on Saturday," James said. "But we're here to work."
"We'll see each other on the court," Chris Bosh said. "That's plenty of time to catch up."
"We haven't talked to those guys, at least I haven't, since we've been here," Mario Chalmers said. "It's like Miami 2.0 over there, basically."
Before James came to the Heat in 2010, he and Wade often made a point to meet up with each other when they were in the same city. They had meals, saw movies or just hung out like any friends living in separate cities would when business trips coincided. Because of the cyclical commitments in their arenas, the Cavs and Heat often are in the same city on the West Coast in January every year. Once, James and Wade plus some teammates met up for an evening when both found themselves in San Francisco.
But on this trip, with both teams in town for four days, there seemed to be no such interests.
It's understandable. In the 2010-11 season, James' first in Miami, the Cavs found themselves in Los Angeles with the Heat at the same time. Instead of staying at the same hotel in Beverly Hills as they normally would have, the Cavs moved down the street. It was just uncomfortable, all the baggage weighting down the situation.
Perhaps now the Heat can relate. This January, the two teams will just miss each other by a few hours in Los Angeles, staving off another hotel showdown. So they'll just keep up the perfunctory pleasantries.
"I'm still cool with all those guys," James said.
"He'll always be my big brother," Chalmers said.
"There's no hard feelings," Bosh said.
Everyone is just perfectly polite as they retreat to their respective corners.
The teams' first interactions with each other came Thursday afternoon, when some Cavs players arrived to give a clinic to local kids at the end of the Heat's practice in the same gym. Wade embraced Kyrie Irving, Irving spent some time with Deng. Kevin Love, a neutral party in this ordeal, greeted the Heat players in typical NBA bro-hug fashion.
Ultimately, these things naturally pass. Players and coaches are constantly on the move in the league. One year you could be changing hotels to avoid uncomfortable elevator rides, a few years later the player who was being avoided could be on your roster -- the oddity the Cavs are experiencing now. This is just the start of the process for the Cavs and Heat. The two teams have been connected, whether they like it or not, in some way for years now. The tension is palpable.
"It'll be good," Wade said, "to try and get the weirdness out now."