Cote: Unprofessional Jimmy Butler quit on Heat and fans and has ruined his legacy in Miami | Opinion
Jimmy Butler will lose this. He already has. No matter what happens from here — even if he successfully pouts his way to Phoenix before the NBA’s Feb. 6 trade deadline — he is the loser in this Miami Heat mess of his own doing.
His legacy with the Heat is blown apart, beyond repair without at least unexpected contrition from him that his behavior has been stunningly unprofessional and a flat betrayal of the team paying him $48,798,677 this season. (For those without a calculator, that’s just more than $595,000 per game Butler is being paid to be the professional he has lately failed miserably to be.)
His seven-game suspension followed by a more recent two-game suspension -- and now a third suspension on Monday, this one indefinite, has cost him just more than $3 million thus far and counting (it’s not prorated by game). Poor fella. Should we start a GoFundMe page? I would suggest he might need to get a second job to make ends meet, but he’s already taken on one:
Ruining this Heat season, along with his goodwill and good name in South Florida. At that job, he’s been great.
Spare me that this isn’t about money, by the way. In sports it always is.
Butler, age 35, wanted one last maximum contract extension from the Heat. Club president Pat Riley declined. So Butler is free after this season to leave in free agency or opt in for one more season at $52.4 million.
Opting in, after all of this, would be everybody’s nightmare. It is why the Heat is as desperate to trade Butler as he is to be traded.
Butler, once he knew Miami would not extend his contract, might have decided to be a pro, understand the business decision was rooted in his age and play harder than ever to prove Riley wrong and display his skills for the rest of the league.
Instead he decided to quit.
He quit on the Heat, on his teammates, on coach Erik Spoelstra, on Riley ... and on the fans. He quit on the integrity of the game.
The Heat returns home Monday night vs. Orlando, with Butler no longer eligible to return from suspension because he was suspended again -- this time for angrily storming out of a midday shootaround after being informed he would not start that night and moving forward this season.
It spares Heat fans, for now, this choice if and when he ever is introduced to the home fans again:
Will they stand with the team? With Erik Spoelstra, Bam Adebayo, Tyler Herro, Pat Riley and everything Heat Culture embodies?
Or will they stand with the selfish ego of the star who quit on everybody?
What’s your call, Miami?
Here’s mine: Good riddance. That’s harsh. But there were so many other, better ways for Butler to handle this as an adult, and a professional.
Butler’s Heat legacy could have been as a beloved player in that second tier below Dwyane Wade. He led Miami to two NBA Finals and a conference final his first five seasons. Made a couple of All-Star teams. He was fun, quirky. Jimmy Buckets. Playoff Jimmy.
Then he became Jim-ME at the sour end as he turned his back on everything but his own interests in the middle of a season.
This ugliest of sports divorces appears irreparable now because hurt and pride are involved and because Butler and Riley are alpha males who have dug in deep and won’t blink.
Butler is trying to flex the NBA era of player empowerment to get what he wants and go where he wants — everything else including his own team in the heart of its season be damned. Riley has accrued and earned his power in a lifetime given to this league and will deploy it like an arsenal as needed.
Butler’s idea of flexing his power was first two miss five games for a supposed illness. Soon after he told reporters he did not think he could find joy any longer playing for Miami, after it had become apparent his performance was being affected.
The Heat suspended him seven games for “continued pattern of disregard of team rules and conduct detrimental to the team.” After a few games back with a lack of effort apparent, he missed this week’s team flight to Milwaukee. A two-game suspension followed, with Miami citing not only “conduct detrimental to the team but “insubordinate conduct.”
During one game back he wore Phoenix Suns-colored sneakers in a game. The night of his obviously intentionally missed fight, he attended a social event at a yacht club,.
The gall of this man would be impressive if it weren’t so stunningly petulant. Monday was just the latest juvenile chapter.
The Heat’s full statement on Monday: “The Miami Heat are suspending Jimmy Butler without pay effective immediately for an indefinite period to last no fewer than five games. The suspension is due to a continued pattern of disregard of team rules, engaging in conduct detrimental to the team and intentionally withholding services. This includes walking out of practice earlier today.”
Since his trade demand his diminished effort on the court was quantified by ESPN’s Bobby Marks, who said Butler in a recent five-game span scored no more than 57 total points, 42 field goal attempts and 14 free-throw attempts than at any time since 2013. Marks said that in the loss to Portland on Tuesday, Butler moved at a fast speed (more than 14 feet per second) only 5% of the time, his second-lowest percentage in a game with a minimum of 20 minutes played. He passed the ball on 76 percent of his touches, tied for second most in a game this year.
TNT’s Kenny Smith was at that loss in Portland and said: “[Butler’s behavior] is unprofessional. When you miss things you’re supposed to be at and you get paid to be at, there’s no other word for it.”
The Heat should trade Butler for the best deal it can get, with little regard for making the player happy by sending him to Phoenix. Khris Middleton and a draft pick from Milwaukee? Done. Heck, at this point, trading him to Washington or Utah or some other dregs of a team would have a note of poetic justice to it.
The priority is to cut losses and trade the man who has soured the Heat locker room and this season.
Jimmy Butler has made it childishly clear he wants out.
Miami — team, city and fans — should aggressively want the same.
This story was originally published January 24, 2025 at 12:33 PM.
