With the 2018/19 regular season underway, trade chatter around the NBA has quieted down for the time being. Typically, teams don’t complete many trades near the start of the season, since they’re still taking stock of what they have on their rosters — plus, many players don’t become eligible to be dealt until December.
Still, given all the Jimmy Butler trade rumors we heard in the weeks leading up to opening night, it’s a little jarring how quickly those rumors were put on the back burner, as Butler plays alongside the teammates he reportedly berated in practice earlier this month.
Appearing this week on The HoopsHype podcast with Alex Kennedy, ESPN’s Brian Windhorst revisited the Butler situation, exploring where things stand at the moment, and discussing when a deal might get done. Here are a few highlights from that conversation:
- Although team owner Glen Taylor acknowledged that the Timberwolves almost certainly have to trade Butler before February’s deadline, Windhorst thinks it might be “a while” before a deal is completed.
- As Windhorst observes, the Heat always appeared to be the most logical trade partner for Minnesota, but they didn’t want to bid against themselves. When Miami backed off trade talks before the season began, the club was betting that the Timberwolves had no other viable trade possibilities out there for Butler, and that might be true, says Windhorst.
- While the Heat and Rockets, who won’t have cap room in 2019, have reason to pursue Butler in an in-season trade, teams with cap space can afford to be more patient, especially if the four-time All-Star won’t turn them into a title contender right away. Windhorst points to the Clippers as one team that won’t go all-in for Butler on the trade market when they could have an opportunity to go after him in free agency in the summer.
- Interestingly, Windhorst identifies the Mavericks as one of the teams that still has interest in Butler. We heard last month that the Mavs had gauged the asking price for the All-NBA swingman, but a report out of Dallas suggested that it wasn’t a realistic landing spot for him. Like the Clippers, Dallas will have cap space in 2019.
- Windhorst believes that, while they won’t say so publicly, several of the young players on the Timberwolves‘ roster will be “excited” if and when Butler is dealt.
If you are Minnesota and can get Barnes and Brunson why wouldn’t you do it? Josh Okogie looks very promising.
Because Jimmy is a really good player. I’m not giving him up unless I have too, and I can’t think of a team with less drive than a team where KAT, Wiggins, and Harrison Barnes are the core.
That would be solid, they do have Okogie also so you should take that into consideration. Point is Towns and Wiggins aren’t feeding off Jimmy’s leadership and it’s rub off the wrong way, not every player responds to that kind of leadership much less from a player who hasn’t won anything in his career so Barnes would be perfect because the experiment of him as a first option is not going to work in Dallas. It’s shaping up to be Doncic’s team with Smith Jr as the 2nd-3rd option assuming Jimmy goes there plus they have the cap space to re-sign him. Plus he’s from Texas also.
Without jimmy the wolves are a lotto team. Thibs knows this. He also knows he may get fired if they miss the playoffs. Gotta play this one right
Agree Okogie looks very promising .. I would rather see the T-WOLVES trade Wiggins than Butler . Not sure that is possible ??
Towns doesn’t want to play with Butler, you can clearly tell. The game Jimmy was out he went off for 29 and 16. I would not move Wiggins.
The wolves would also rather trade Wiggins than Butler, but that was going to be pretty difficult. Once Butler demanded out, that idea is out the door
Anyone else just simply flat-out sick of stinking Jimmy Butler stories ?
Don’t read then nobody tells you to read them.
Here all this time I thought federal law required me to read all the Jimmy Butler stories. Thanks for clarifying for us.
Them
New news unlikely. Played out for now.
Future x%sure says: ouch! Very next day I think, new news… if the 4 #1s is true…
The Clippers said they lost interest because of Butler’s going off the first practice he came back.