The coalition of talent assembled on the Miami Heat in 2010 was the start of an era of player control that would redefine the NBA as we know it. Chris Bosh, who took part in the original player-orchestrated superteam, explained that the plan to team up with LeBron James and Dwyane Wade had gears in motion way before they got together for the 2008 Olympics.

Despite what most think, there was no backroom summit in Beijing to join forces in Miami two years later, as Bosh explained.

“I mean, we had each other’s phone numbers,” Bosh told Ben Rohrbach of Yahoo Sports. “People still ask me, and I tell them, ‘Look, I wish it was that cool, like a secret room with James Bond, but unfortunately it didn’t go down like that.’”

The groundwork for this move was laid even before 2008, as James, Wade and Bosh all signed three-year rookie scale extensions instead of the five-year max that their fellow 2003 draftmate Carmelo Anthony had signed with the Denver Nuggets, which left him out of the equation, leaving the other three to timely hit free agency together in 2010.

However, their experiences with Team USA did help plant the seed of what it'd be like to sum their powers in one NBA supergiant.

“It was on the tip of everybody’s tongue,” Bosh continued. “It started with all of us signing three-year deals instead of five-year deals, just to maintain flexibility. We were looking at it like we needed to remain flexible, and usually it’s great to lock yourself in… but at the same time in this game, you want to be flexible. You only get so many years to get something out of this game.

“It’s kind of taken on a life of its own now. It’s crazy now, but the game is always going to evolve. It’s always going to change. People just have to change with it.”

It was ultimately the players who played more than the game, but also played by the rules while playing the rules and taking the chance to come together in South Beach for what would be a four-year venture that yielded two championships and a hell of a lot of lessons for other players to take notice — and have they taken notice.