Late Wednesday ESPN reported that the Miami Heat have traded Jimmy Butler to the Golden State Warriors, for Kyle Anderson, Andrew Wiggins and a protected 2026 first-round pick.
Butler became a disgruntled superstar last year when the Heat declined to sign him to a max longterm extension. Butler then was suspended multiple times this season by the Heat for “conduct detrimental to the team”
Butler as part of the deal, agreed to a new two-year contract extension with the Warriors.
One tidbit from the ESPN report is that Kerr repeatedly told the media in recent weeks and days that he did not want the Warriors “to do anything crazy”.
“Don’t do anything crazy,” Kerr said. “We are not in that position. I think it is important for every organization to know where they are and understand the circumstances and then you see the possibilities. Draymond, Steph and I have talked about this privately; we have talked about this with [Warriors general manager] Mike [Dunleavy Jr.]. There is a responsibility to the organization to do the right thing and to not beg for some crazy trade that is going to put the next 10 years in jeopardy.”
While giving up Anderson and Wiggins two aging veterans and this year’s first round pick is not putting the team in jeopardy for the next ten years, adding Butler is in fact a crazy trade. Maybe we’re reading too much into it, but that’s the entire point of NBA trade season.
The Warriors are currently the 11th placed team in a packed Western Conference, but are just five games back from the fourth-seed in the West. Steph Curry is 36. The Warriors front office wants to give it one more go it appears before a rebuild happens. That one more go involves Jimmy Butler, after an attempted trade for Kevin Durant with Phoenix fizzled out after Durant allegedly asserted he did not want to return to the Warriors.
It became apparent in the final weeks of Butler’s tenure in Miami that the relationship between player and coach had deteriorated. It looked pretty bad. Of course Butler was forcing his way out of Miami. Miami coach Erik Spoelstra, to his credit, simply said “We work in a league of complexity” when describing the chaos that ensued as Butler was suspended and put away from the team.
“We’re in an unusual place right now, but really, it’s all complex, and we fully plan on operating within this complexity.”
Complexity in this case appears to be a substitute for dysfunction.
Butler’s days with Miami were numbered.
Warriors Steve Kerr coach and Spoelstra are close friends, both USA basketball coaches.
Kerr too knows how to coach in complexity.
We’ll see if the Warriors with Butler can make a run at it.