"Worth every single cent": LeBron James, Bam Adebayo and NBA personalities react to Erik Spoelstra's reported $120-plus million contract

Champion Miami Heat coach Erik Spoelstra agreed to stay with the team for eight more years, in a deal reportedly worth at least $120 million. His players, both past and present, and other NBA personalities congratulated him for the new deal.

The Heat announced the agreement on Tuesday night, ensuring that "Coach Spo" will go beyond his 16th season coaching in South Beach.

Upon learning of the development, a number of NBA personalities reacted to it, including LeBron James, with whom Erik Spoelstra won back-to-back NBA titles in 2012 and 2013.

"The King" took to X, formerly Twitter, and wrote:

“Worth Every Single Cent of that contract!!! Congrats Spo!!”

Others who reacted and congratulated the 53-year-old coach included current Heat player Bam Adebayo and New York Knicks’ Josh Hart. They wrote:

Spoelstra is in his 29th year with the Miami organization overall. He started in the video room in 1995 and steadily climbed the ranks, becoming an assistant coach and eventually being selected as the successor to Pat Riley as head coach in 2008.

While with the team, he has won three titles, including in 2006 as an assistant, and was named NBA All-Star Game head coach twice in 2013 and 2022.

He is currently the NBA’s second longest-tenured coach, behind only Hall-of-Famer Gregg Popovich of the San Antonio Spurs.

This past summer, he was assistant to Steve Kerr of the Golden State Warriors in coaching Team USA at the 2023 FIBA World Cup, and will also be part of the coaching staff for the United States in the Paris Olympic Games later this year.

Erik Spoelstra champions hard work with Heat

Apart from bringing steady success for much of his tenure with the Miami Heat, another facet of the coaching of Erik Spoelstra that has stood out is how championing hard work, particularly in training, is important.

Such has brought stability to the Spoelstra-led Heat, particularly in the last couple of years where they have been very competitive notwithstanding that they have not been top-of-mind contenders off the bat.

Case in point was their run to the NBA Finals last season as the No. 8 seed team in the Eastern Conference, which had to go through the play-in tournament just to book a spot in the playoffs.

While they lost in five games to the Denver Nuggets in the NBA Finals, their run only solidified their standing as one of the more outstanding franchises in the league.

Heading into the ongoing season, Erik Spoelstra shared where Miami’s campaign under him is anchored, saying via the Associated Press:

“We’re about the sweat and the grind. It’s about when nobody’s watching. We have a saying at the Heat: ‘There’s a beauty in the grind, there’s a beauty in the sweat.’ That’s about what happens behind the scenes.”

In the current NBA campaign, the Heat has a 21-15 record, sitting fifth in the Eastern Conference.