Jimmy Butler wanted to leave Minnesota in 2018 and got his way.
Jimmy Butler wanted to leave Philadelphia in 2019 and got his way.
Now Jimmy Butler wants to leave Miami and will likely get his way again.
But this time, he's a 35-year-old asking for hundreds of millions of dollars and overplaying his hand against one of the NBA's best front-office poker players, Heat president Pat Riley.
We believe Riley should call Butler's bluff and send him home — as in his actual home in Miami — until the season ends or an offer for a career disgruntled 35-year-old looking for hundreds of millions of dollars entices Riley to grant Butler's request on Riley's terms, whichever comes first.
Yes, the Heat should sit Jimmy Butler for the rest of the season and play on without his off-court distractions and on-court sabotaging play. Then he can play wherever he wishes.
The Jimmy Butler answer that will be everywhere tonight and tomorrow and moving forward. The beginning of the end it would appear. pic.twitter.com/ukuW1WnP7N
— Will Manso (@WillManso) January 3, 2025
How We Got Here
If it feels like a funeral around the Miami Heat these past few weeks as Butler subtly, then not so subtly, requests that the Heat send him anywhere else to play basketball, that's because the Butler-Miami era of basketball is a dead man walking.But don't take our word for it; listen to Jimmy Butler telling the media after last night's 128-115 loss to the Indiana Pacers at the Kaseya Center how he's desperate to "get his joy back from playing basketball, wherever that may be." And if that wasn't obvious enough, when asked if he could get his joy back on the court in Miami, Butler bluntly answered, "No."
So Butler wants to leave Miami, and according to ESPN's Shams Charania, the destination no longer matters. He's that bitter about Pat Riley refusing to extend his contract beyond the $55 million player option he's due this offseason. His preference for a trade assumed that a new team would pay enough to acquire him, and it would only make sense that they'd also pay the multiyear extension bounty required to keep him beyond 2025-26.Reporting for @SportsCenter -- Jimmy Butler formally indicates to the Heat that he wants to play anywhere but Miami. pic.twitter.com/2G5nVMOnUR
— Shams Charania (@ShamsCharania) January 3, 2025
Dwyane Wade tells the Chicago Bulls that he’ll join them, according to @TheVertical. pic.twitter.com/LcB77VqurM
— B/R Football (@brfootball) July 7, 2016
Isn't It Ironic, Don't You Think?
Jimmy Butler came to Miami on the advice of his good friend and former teammate, Dwyane Wade. That fact now becomes ironic, knowing that once upon a time, it was Butler who infamously lured Wade to the Chicago Bulls in 2016, only to blow up the organization with his antics and trade requests the following year, leading to Butler's eventual trade to the Timberwolves and Wade reaching a buyout agreement with the Bulls.Now Butler wants to leave Miami — a place he took less money to come to win and compete with a competent and stable front office behind him — for seemingly any place that will pay him his asking price. A man who has made $312 million in the league and won zero titles — not in high school, not in college, not in the NBA — now wants the respect that comes with more money, as opposed to the best chance to win.
I'm telling you, if you have to take back bad money and get no firsts in the deal, the Heat is better off not playing him if he's uncooperative (they could work out personal reasons as absence) and get flexibility next summer with two large exceptions, other avenues available.
— Barry Jackson (@flasportsbuzz) January 3, 2025
Decisions, Decisions, Decisions
Knowing all this, Pat Riley and the Heat are now at a crossroads: Do they continue co-parenting the rest of the 2024-25 season with a disgruntled star player best known for having no reservations about doing his best to embarrass a front office and disrespect teammates and coaches? Or do they succumb to his trade demands and send him on his way? Fortunately for the Heat, and unfortunately for Butler, there is a third option: Tell him to go away.As the Miami Herald's Barry Jackson has explained in detail, simply keeping Butler on the roster into the offseason would put the ball in his court: Either he opts into his one-year, $55 million player option or he leaves in free agency. If Butler desires the money he seeks, a trade would be the only way to get top dollar.
No team besides the Heat can pay Butler what they can via an extension, but if he's traded, those rules transfer to his new team. If Butler leaves in free agency, the Heat will gain flexibility but lose a star for nothing. Both scenarios fast forward and skip all the drama that seems to be in store for them until April.
For Miami, the move would mean that in 2026 the team would have the maximum space to sign an elite player while the rest of its roster matures. For Butler, it would mean gambling that another team in the NBA doesn't see what Miami clearly does: an aging player who is often injured and only occasionally motivated to try his hardest (when he's in a good mood, of course).
The decision seems clear. If Jimmy Butler wants to be in Golden State, Dallas, Houston, or Paris to watch some tennis, for that matter, he's welcome to visit. The Heat shouldn't be giving in to demands from a player they've given everything to since he chose to sign in Miami following a career defined by playing in cities he wanted out of.
The Heat were fine before Jimmy Butler set foot in Miami, and they'll continue to be fine once he's gone. The sooner, the better.
