Taking his talents away from South Beach
Jimmy Butler was a perfect fit for the Miami Heat, right up until he wasn't
In early December of 2019, the Miami Heat visited the Toronto Raptors at Scotiabank Arena.
The Raptors, in the middle of a sturdy, post-Kawhi title defence that would be completely derailed by COVID a couple of months later, played well, but the Heat tied the game late on a Jimmy Butler free throw and forced overtime. Then Butler took over for a brief spell, scoring the first eight points of the extra frame, including a steal on defence, and that was pretty much that.
On my way to the media room, which is behind the visitors’ locker room in the bowels of the arena, I saw Butler make his way through the tunnel after he had finished with on-court television interviews. He approached a member of the arena security staff whose regular gig was standing by the door outside the visitors’ room. Butler broke into a wide grin. “I TOLD YOU,” he shouted, and gave the security man a playful pat on the shoulder. “I TOLD YOU MOTHER(expletive).” Jimmy was fired up.
I went over and asked the guard what that was all about. He said Butler had told him pre-game that the Heat would win. And that he would score the winning basket.
The thing is, the Heat spent most of that fourth quarter in the lead, and the Raptors only jumped ahead in the final minute. I like to think that Butler suddenly remembered the promise he had made to a security guard and basically decided to take over an NBA game, against the defending champions, for about five minutes.
Jimmy Butler might be just that crazy.
Unfortunately for the Miami Heat, with Butler you get the whole package, as they are now discovering. Jimmy Buckets is presently serving a seven-game suspension for “conduct detrimental” to his team, which basically amounts to putting a trade request out in the open. The Heat and Butler have been a fine match, two Finals appearances in five seasons so far. When he went there after the 2019 season it was a mild surprise, only because Miami had for years been considered a likely destination for a huge free-agent fish: Kevin Durant, Kyrie Irving, Kawhi Leonard, Giannis Antetokounmpo, someone in that mega-star tier. Butler was a notch below that, and in going to the Heat he had joined a team that didn’t have a superstar already in place. His move was against trend, but it was effective. The Heat with Butler and under coach Eric Spoelstra were far better than their individual parts might suggest. He’s an intense competitor, and they embraced his whole win-at-all-costs vibe. You can roll your eyes at the whole Heat Culture thing, and I have, but there’s no denying that they had better results than their roster would suggest.
So, what went wrong? Hard to say.
There is talk that Butler was miffed that the Heat didn’t offer him a giant contract extension in the summer, although Heat president Pat Riley had his reasons: Butler is 35 and missed all of last year’s playoffs due to injury. Butler also went on a podcast and said the Heat would have beaten the Knicks and Celtics in the post-season if he had been healthy, which caused Riley to essentially say that injured players should shut their yaps. Jimmy probably didn’t like that.
Whatever the reasons, Butler says he isn’t happy in Miami anymore and he wants out. Which is kind of fitting, for one of the NBA’s crankiest stars: even the team that seemed most suited to his all-effort playing style couldn’t keep him happy. And, let’s be honest, he’s a a handful. Chicago traded him to Minnesota, who thought he could be the veteran leader on a team that had young stars in Karl-Anthony Towns and Andrew Wiggins. Butler, though, quickly became fed up with what he felt was the lack of hustle from a couple of guys who had signed mega-contracts while still in their early 20s. He infamously destroyed his teammates in a practice scrimmage with the Wolves, who promptly shipped him to Philadelphia lest he embarrass the franchise players any longer. With the Sixers, Butler was soon back in the same situation. He was less naturally talented than teammates Joel Embiid and Ben Simmons, but he was by far the most alpha guy on the team. He almost dragged Philadelphia past the Kawhi-led Raptors in the playoffs, and who knows what would have happened had a certain shot not bounced on the rim four times before falling through in Game 7. Would the Sixers have won the title that Toronto ultimately did?
But The Shot did fall, and Butler decided he had seen enough of the Sixers. He was on to Miami. Now he will be, presumably, on to somewhere else. That next part won’t be easy. Butler is making almost $50-million this season and has an option for $52-million next year; the number of contending teams able to take on that kind of contract without blowing up their roster is low. Plus he is, as mentioned, a bit of a crank. Signing up for the full Jimmy Butler experience brings some risks.
But someone will probably figure out a way to do it. Jimmy Butler, happy and engaged, is a basketball force. Wherever he goes, though, he should probably rent.
In case you missed it, politics edition
More than a decade ago, I went to cover a speech by Justin Trudeau at the Delta Chelsea in Toronto. He was the newly elected leader of the Liberal Party of Canada, and I wanted to see him in action. I thought he was perfectly ridiculous, and wrote about it, but it was also quite clear that a lot of people quite liked his schtick.
For the Toronto Star this week, I wrote about the charisma that sent him to the country’s highest office, and the fact that he never learned a new trick.
And on the weekend, also over at the Star, I had a piece on what I think was one of 2024’s enduring mysteries: what is up with the Ontario Liberals?