SAN FRANCISCO — In the minutes after the Golden State Warriors wrapped up a five-game trip in Brooklyn earlier this month, Jimmy Butler pulled Steve Kerr aside for a brief conversation in the visiting locker room.
The message: He wasn’t flying back to San Francisco with the team. He needed to fly separately to Miami.
“To pick my kids up,” Butler said.
As he did occasionally with the Miami Heat — in an arrangement permitted early in his time with the organization and grumbled about later — Butler will not stay at the team hotel during the Warriors’ four-day stop in Miami this week. It’s a rare in-season chance for him to spend extended time away from the arena with his three young children, who live there, so he’s staying somewhere with more space and privacy.
That’s why he zipped out of the arena right after the Brooklyn game. The Warriors were about to start a two-week homestand, and he wanted his children around while adjusting to a new city. So he needed to get to Miami to travel with them to San Francisco.
“I pulled Steve aside and said, ‘Steve, I’m finna fly home and grab my kids,’” Butler recalled. “He said, ‘Oh, OK. Yeah. See you back in the Bay.’ Like nothing else. Nothing.”
Butler makes it clear: This wasn’t a request; it was a courtesy alert. His stature and success have generated an amount of power he has — and will — unapologetically leverage. He’d never had a conversation with Kerr prior to the trade-deadline blockbuster that sent him to Golden State. But in their first one-on-one, the Warriors’ coach laid out his two non-negotiables: Show up on time and compete to win as part of the group. That’s it.
“We welcome personal quirkiness and individualism, and I think guys always feel a sense of freedom here,” Kerr said. “I told Jimmy that from Day 1. I said, ‘You be you.’”
For Butler, it was an easy sell. No matter how he gets to practices and games (often separate from the team), he’s extremely punctual. He’s also considered one of the NBA’s premier winners, and his arrival has coincided with a complete turnaround. The Warriors were 25-26 before acquiring him. They are 16-4 since.
“We need him, and he needs us,” Kerr said. “I think it’s perfect timing for his arrival.”
When that Brooklyn game ended, Butler had just helped lift the Warriors to a 4-1 trip as Stephen Curry’s new co-star. The next time Kerr required his players to show up to work would be two days later for a walkthrough before a home game against the Detroit Pistons. What Butler or any player did in the next 40 hours was entirely up to them. So Butler said he wasn’t worried about Kerr’s reaction to his plan.
“No,” Butler shrugged. “Because I was going to do it anyway. I’m going to let you know. But nothing comes before my family. Not a game. Not nothing. I’m going to go pick up my kids. Because I ain’t seen them since before the f—ing trade. I need to see my babies.”
The Warriors — and Kerr, in particular — run a famously loose, family friendly operation. Former players, like DeMarcus Cousins, rave about it, noting Kerr’s willingness to allow family and close friends on the team plane. Kids are always running around the facility.
Andrew Wiggins, the primary player sent to Miami in the Butler trade, appreciated how delicately the Warriors handled the situation surrounding Wiggins’ ailing father. Draymond Green’s son has served as an equipment manager during a few games. If Curry wants to venture away from a road trip for a round of off-day golf at an exclusive course, the default answer is yes.
“It’s all about whatever you need,” Butler said. “You would think that every organization is like that: Whatever you need to make you happy, to make you healthy and to make you go out there and compete at an extremely high level. You need your days off. You need the chef. You need the driver. You need to work out. You need the rest. You need your family to travel. How can we keep you happy? How can we get you everything you possibly need to be successful and help us get a banner and a trophy?”
Butler sat down for an extended interview with The Athletic last week. He prefers not to get into the grittier details of his Heat exit, which will re-enter the spotlight ahead of Tuesday’s reunion game in Miami. But an engaged Butler can’t help but deliver enough of his perspective to shed greater light on why his six-season tenure with Miami tilted the wrong direction and why, through six weeks, his time with the Warriors is going so spectacularly.
“All of these stories come out about this and that,” Butler said. “You hear about it, but you don’t know why I do what I do. Don’t nobody know why I do what I do. You just see: ‘Oh, he did this.’ Well, why did he do this? Do you think he did it just to f—ing do it? No. There’s always a reason behind it.”
The Chicago Bulls selected Butler 30th in the 2011 NBA Draft. He didn’t play much as a rookie but forced his way into Tom Thibodeau’s regular rotation his second season. The offseason prior to his third season, when Butler would entrench himself as a starter, the Bulls signed Mike Dunleavy Jr. to start at the small forward spot. Dunleavy, now the Warriors’ general manager, was one of the early veterans who Butler remembers telling him that he was on a star trajectory. It’s why Butler is fond of his new boss.
But even Dunleavy remembers feeling uneasy about Butler’s decision to decline Chicago’s four-year, $44 million extension offer in the summer of 2014. Butler hadn’t exploded yet. There was inherent risk in waiting until restricted free agency for a larger payday.
“I wouldn’t recommend that if it was my own kid,” Dunleavy said. “But it was fun to see him say, ‘All right, motherf—ers, here we go.’ And then he just blew up. Unquestioned max. That was fun to watch as a teammate.”
Butler’s bet on himself translated into a five-year, $90 million deal. Ten years later, inside knowledge of that experience partly drove Dunleavy’s decision to trade for and extend Butler in February, guaranteeing two years and $111 million beyond this season to complete the deal.
Jimmy Butler and Mike Dunleavy Jr. were teammates on the Bulls a decade before Dunleavy, now the Warriors GM, traded for Butler. (Noah Graham / NBAE via Getty Images)
Kerr and Curry wondered how Butler would fit into their environment. Others in the decision-making tree debated whether they should either hold off on an extension offer or negotiate it below the max, team sources said. Dunleavy vouched for Butler, the player and person, and convinced ownership the financial pledge would prove worth it — a motivated Butler would view it as a signal of belief.
“The paying part to me is really easy because basketball-wise, he’s that good,” Dunleavy said. “With Jimmy, you can see the way he elevates his teammates. That intangible is what makes you a max player. I’m not going to pretend to predict the future of how all this is going to play out. But I do have a comfort level in who he is. I’ve been a teammate of his and I understand what makes him tick.”
Butler called the 2014 decision to decline the four-year offer from the Bulls an easy choice. He could feel his skills evolving and had spent the summer torching NBA talent in scrimmages. “I think Chicago knew,” Butler said. “So they was trying to get me for cheap. As they should do. It’s a business. But I’ve always been good at knowing my worth. I will say that. Knowing my value.”
Butler proved correct then, parlaying it into a max contract, and has trusted his gut on business decisions since, using his power and brazenness to help influence his way out of other situations and into $312 million of career earnings.
“Chicago was being cheap, actually. They didn’t want to pay me the supermax,” Butler said of the Bulls’ decision to trade him to Minnesota in 2017. “It wasn’t about the money in other places. It was about winning. And with winning comes everything else that you could want. With winning comes the money. With winning comes the fame.
“If you do it for the women, if you do it for the cars, if you do it for the houses, if you do it for the private flights — you win, you get all of that. So everything that I’ve always done after that (first) contract was legitimately based off of winning.”
It’s why, Butler indicated, he didn’t see a long-term fit in Minnesota and acted accordingly, requesting a trade ahead of the 2018 season. After the move to Philadelphia, he found an environment he said lacked accountability — quiet film sessions and an inability to absorb criticism and correct mistakes. His bluntness didn’t land. His stay with the Sixers was brief.
“You got to be able to talk to everybody,” Butler said. “As long as it was in the right direction toward winning, it shouldn’t matter how it comes across. It’s not that there’s malicious intent about it. You had some differences between players and coaches. You had some differences between players and players. And it was just, I mean, you kind of couldn’t talk to nobody.”
Butler noted the level of accountability he has felt in his first six weeks with the Warriors.
“Steph and Dray have been doing it their entire f—ing career,” Butler said. “You can talk how the hell you want to talk knowing that look, I don’t have a 10-minute window to get my point across. I got to get it across in 27 seconds before the timeout ends or we’re going to get a delay game or tech or something like that. I’m serious about it. You see my tone. You see I’m looking at you face-to-face. That’s what happens here.”
In some of his denser interviews after signing with Miami in 2019, Butler came across as a player who’d found what he craved. In a podcast with JJ Redick, he promoted the benefits of the Heat’s famed culture and the work habits it cultivated. The franchise also bent some of its stricter rules to accommodate his preferences.
In retrospect, it might not have been the perfect NBA marriage, but it was ultimately a successful one, even without a championship. Butler took the Heat on three deep playoff runs and powered two flawed rosters to Eastern Conference titles. He found an organization that prioritized winning.
“There was some foundation to it in the sense of the work and all that stuff, which is great,” Butler said last week. “I’m not saying it in a bad way, but I think it’s a little bit, like, overused talking about the ‘Heat Culture.’ It is a great organization. But I think a large part of that culture is you get guys that buy into a (winning mindset). You get some guys that buy in, you get some really good players and you get the opportunity to talk about ‘Heat Culture’ a little bit more. I’’m not saying it to talk down or anything, but I think whenever you have really good players you can name it whatever you want to name it.”
Butler didn’t mention Heat president Pat Riley once in the 30-minute sitdown, but there’s little question that his split with the team stemmed from a deteriorated relationship with the Heat’s ultimate decision-maker in relation to the roster the Heat built — the title-level help Butler felt he didn’t receive — and, perhaps most damaging, Riley’s hands-on approach to everyday operations.
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Butler has revealed before that part of the reason he left Philadelphia is because he heard leadership there say they’d have him back “if they could control him.” That type of approach is also part of what pushed him out of Miami.
“That’s too hard to do,” Butler said. “You can’t control grown men in this line of work. You can try, but I’m going to do what I want to do. I’m going to show up. I’m going to compete and I’m going to help us win.
“So you can be mad. You can paint a picture that is not entirely true. I don’t even need to get into that. They know what they’re doing. You got to paint somebody to be the bad guy. I’ll take being a bad guy. Makes no difference. I’m here now. I’m competing at a high level and I’m helping the Golden State Warriors win. They want me here. Hell, I’m cool with being a bad guy over there.”
Buddy Hield, one of Butler’s closest confidants on his new team, said the Warriors’ best organizational quality is their lack of micromanaging. Butler said it is the “little things” that they do — and don’t do. He has quirks and odd requests. They’ve accommodated to a degree that, it appears clear, the buttoned-up Heat wouldn’t.
“It’s minuscule and it’s small,” he said. “But if I said I just don’t play well in a red headband, (the Warriors) would say then don’t f—ing wear the red headband. Wear a black one. Wear a white one. Wear a purple one. I don’t give a f—. Just win the game. That’s how they think.
“And it’s not (so I can) be different. It’s just like, man, this is what makes me feel comfortable. This is what I like. And you can express that, and they’ll be like, ‘OK, cool. Go win.’ That’s what it’s about.”
After asking out of Miami, Butler didn’t initially want to be traded to the Warriors. He was trying to muscle his way to the Phoenix Suns because he was more familiar with Kevin Durant, Devin Booker and Tyus Jones, his former teammate.
“I wasn’t skeptical of coming here,” Butler said. “I just didn’t talk to anybody. … I knew I was going to get this contract no matter what. The people keep talking about it being about the money. How can it be about the money when any team that traded for me, what were they going to do? I just want to win. Where can I go to win?”
Curry admits initial reluctance when approached about adding Butler. He’s protective of what he’s built and has a risk-averse side to his personality.
“With any deal, you question it,” Curry said. “Even when KD came, it was like, you don’t know what it’s going to look like. We came into it positive, but you still had to see it. That uncomfortability is good because it challenges everyone to talk through it, come with the right preparation.”
Curry doesn’t claim the Warriors have the perfect work environment. Plenty of drama and unprofessionalism have popped up through the years despite the success. But he glows about the Butler experience through six weeks.
“I can only speak for this environment because I only know this environment and I helped create this environment,” Curry said. “If (quirky habits) bother you, if that’s something that is distracting, then you’re worried about the wrong stuff. Professionals show up and play. And that’s all we ask of everybody who is in here. We’ve had our challenges throughout the years. We’ve seen certain, you know, episodes or what not. But if you show up to play, I have zero problems.”
Butler raves about Curry, both publicly and privately.
“He real real,” Butler said. “Good dude. Talks. He’s always trying to help everybody be great. Laughs. Wants to have a good time. Loves the game. Loves to compete. Loves to win. But he is the guy. He is the man. He is everything everybody says of him. More than anything, he’s just nice. I’m not talking about on the court. He’s just genuinely a good human being. To everybody. It’s very, very, very refreshing. Because he doesn’t have to be that way.”
Skeptics call this the Butler honeymoon stage, but the Warriors don’t believe in worrying about an expiration date on rosy feelings. This isn’t about the long-term. The Warriors traded for Butler and lined up his contract with Curry’s and Green’s to give this group two to three shots at playoff glory before an inevitable rebuild. They don’t fear how it ends because it’s going to end regardless.
“The contracts are all lined up with a defined timeline,” Curry emphasized. “You never know what will happen. But that’s not by accident. So I don’t think anyone’s worried about anything other than right now. We have this year and next year to go for it all. Whatever happens after that is the nature of the NBA. We don’t think too far beyond that.”
“I’m not naive,” Kerr said. “I’m sure there will be difficult moments in the next few years. But that’s the league. I don’t shy away from that. Jimmy’s an incredibly smart, prideful player. The league is tough. There are going to be moments where it’s not going to be as smooth as it is right now, but that’s fine. It’s part of it.”
Next up on that immediate agenda is a reunion game on Tuesday night in Miami, which is sure to drum up a local storm, something Butler can’t fully ignore.
“What I will tell you is I know the (Miami) fan base really appreciates myself and what I’ve done there,” Butler said. “I’m pretty sure my teammates — my former teammates — do as well. And honestly, I think the whole organization does. When you realize that this is a business, you understand that business isn’t always pretty. It’s not always going to end the way that you want it to end. You just got to be appreciative of what happened and the memories that you’re able to gain throughout it.”
But …
“I got a job to do,” Butler said. “People think that this game means more than any other game. We’re trying to win as many as we can. Just like they trying to win as many as they can. And it ain’t going to be no different. We’re going to go out there and we gonna hoop. We’re going to play together. And it’s not going to be Jimmy Butler trying to score 70. That’s not it. Like I tell y’all all the time, it’s all about winning.”
(Illustration: Demetrius Robinson / The Athletic, Photos: Michael Reaves, Elsa, David Jensen / Getty Images)
