After meeting with doctor, Heat’s Jimmy Butler says work to ‘maintain’ right knee will continue
Miami Heat star Jimmy Butler met with a doctor in Los Angeles on Saturday about his troublesome right knee. The news Butler received was mostly positive, but it’s an issue that he will need to continue to manage.
“I still got some work to do, though,” Butler said following the Heat’s morning shootaround at UCLA ahead of Monday night’s matchup against the Los Angeles Clippers at Crypto.com Arena. “It’s not where it needs to be, but I got [Heat assistant athletic trainer Armando Rivas] to make sure that I’m good.
“We just got to maintain this thing and take care of it. I mean, it’s part of the game, but I want to be right, I wanted to be a hundred [percent] so I can go out there and do what I’m supposed to do.”
Butler, 33, played in Monday’s game against the Clippers after missing the Heat’s road win against the Utah Jazz on Saturday night on the second night of a back-to-back. He arrived in Los Angeles over the weekend ahead of the team to meet with a doctor.
The Heat did not play Butler in both games of any December back-to-back as part of the team’s injury management plan for his right knee. The hope is that pattern will change and the Heat won’t need to be as cautious with Butler moving forward, but the knee will have to continue to be monitored.
“It is. Because I can go out there and compete,” Butler said when asked if the injury is trending in a positive direction. “I can’t say that I’m fully healthy. But there are a lot of people that are not. So I think that’s good on a lot of levels. The more rest that I have and able to get that recovery that I need is always going to be better. So hell, whenever I’m not playing, I’m doing something to try to get it right.”
The knee was also a problem for Butler during last season’s playoff run. He missed Game 5 of the Heat’s first-round playoff series against the Atlanta Hawks because of right knee inflammation and exited Game 3 of the Heat’s Eastern Conference finals series against the Boston Celtics early because of right knee inflammation.
This season, Butler missed seven straight games in November because of right knee soreness. The Heat’s injury management plan for the knee also kept Butler out for three additional games in December as the team works to keep him healthy.
Including other injuries that Butler has dealt with this season, he has missed 14 of the Heat’s first 37 games. He’s under contract with the Heat through the 2025-26 season.
“He is definitely trending in a much better direction and we just want to keep him there, and that’s what these appointments were,” Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said of Butler on Monday. “And they were good so far.”
Butler entered Monday averaging 21.8 points on a career-best 52.8 percent shooting from the field to go with 6.7 rebounds, 5.8 assists and 2.1 steals per game this season.
“It’ll get there. It’ll definitely get there,” Butler said when asked whether his knee can ever get back to 100 percent. “I just got to keep doing these recovery exercises and warming up the right way. I’m going to be alright.”
THIS AND THAT
▪ Heat rookie forward Nikola Jovic returned to Miami to have his back checked out by a doctor. Jovic has been dealing with ongoing lower back spasms for the last few weeks.
Jovic is one of three Heat players ruled out for Monday’s game against the Clippers, along with Dewayne Dedmon (health and safety protocols) and Omer Yurtseven (left ankle surgery).
This story was originally published January 2, 2023 at 4:15 PM.
