Butler scored 18 points on 15 shots in his first game back from a seven-game suspension
Jimmy Butler’s seven-game suspension came to an end Friday night as the star forward returned to action with the Miami Heat, who were promptly smoked by the visiting Denver Nuggets, 133-113.
There were two schools of thought regarding how Butler might approach the game amid his standing trade demand, which he reportedly issued early in the new year: Either he would come out completely disengaged out of spite, as he largely was in the games preceding his suspension, or he would put the pedal down and go scorched earth in an effort to prove a different kind of point.
In the end, he didn’t really do either. If you were looking for drama, Butler’s run-of-the-mill performance — 18 points on 15 shots with three rebounds and two assists — didn’t oblige, either on the court or in his initial postgame comments, which he kept straightforward as it pertained to the actual basketball.
“I guess it’s basketball at this point,” Butler said. “I know what I’m expected to do while I’m here. I’m trying to do that to the best of my ability. We are where we are.”
Later in his comments, however, Butler did get a little more detailed in his remarks regarding all the discussion that has been happening around him and the circumstances of his trade demand.
“It was a lot said by everybody, except for me, to tell you the truth,” Butler said. “So we’ll let people keep talking like they know everything, like they have all the answers, and then sooner or later the whole truth will come out. But until then, we’ll continue to let people talk, and if I’m here, I will get out there and play.”
Butler went on to say that he doesn’t even attempt to separate fact from fiction when it comes to the reporting on his situation.
“I expect for people to talk,” Butler said. “Half the reason is because don’t nobody ever really know what I’m doing, so [they] just make up stuff. Which is fine. And honestly, I really don’t pay any attention to it, but I’ve got people telling me, ‘Oh they said this, they said that,’ and it’s like it’s really all good. I don’t have to clear anything up. So you know, more power to you, keep talking, and we’ll see where we end up.”
As for Heat coach Erik Spoelstra, he just straight up refused to indulge reporters with any comment about the Butler trade situation in his postgame press conference.
“I know what storylines you guys are looking for,” Spoelstra said. “I’m not feeding into any of that. Tonight, we got our asses kicked. I know what you want to talk about. I know what I saw out there from a defensive standpoint. It was not good enough.”
In true Heat-culture form, Spoelstra is not going to make the story about any one player, even when it’s the team’s best player who is trying to force his way off the team. The Heat are about the Heat. That is likely an element of Butler’s ego hit as the franchise did not bend to him with the contract extension he wanted and believed he deserved this past offseason.
Last postseason, Pat Riley chastised Butler for comments he made following Miami’s first-round loss to the Celtics — which Butler said the Heat would’ve won had he not been injured. At every turn, the Heat have made it clear that they don’t bow down to players and that Riley’s ego, in particular, can outsize even the best players in the game. Ask LeBron James about his Miami exit. Ask Dwyane Wade, who felt forced to leave Miami when Riley wouldn’t even bend to him, a franchise icon, in the latter stage of his career.
Butler is no different, which is problematic in that Butler — if you can read between the lines of his actions and comments throughout his career — believes himself to be absolutely different. He doesn’t think any player or team is bigger or better than he is. It’s part of what makes him great. It’s perhaps also part of his reported annoyance over what he believes is an offensive transition being made toward prioritizing Tyler Herro and Bam Adebayo as the focal points.
So he wants out. He has said there is no way to fix the situation in Miami. And until he gets his way, ESPN’s Ramona Shelburne reported that there is a “palpable dread at what [Butler] might do and the environment the ongoing chaos might create” within the Miami locker room and organization at large.
Well, for at least one night, it was crisis averted. The Heat lost the game, but Butler played with an acceptable level of effort and didn’t pull any headline-seeking stunts during or after the game. That doesn’t show up on the scoreboard, but it’s a small win for the Heat.
