Pat Riley has never been one to mince words. Even with his star players. The Miami Heat president recently had some remarks about his star player, Jimmy Butler, that caused a stir in the NBA realm. Butler’s future with the Heat organization is in question after what Riley said about the possibility of offering him an extension.
“We have not discussed that internally right now,” Riley said. “We have to look at making that kind of commitment and when do we do it. We don’t have to do it until 2025 actually. But we’ll see. We haven’t made a decision on it, and we haven’t really in earnest discussed it.”
Riley was also not a fan of Butler’s comments after the Heat took a game off the one-seeded Boston Celtics in round one of the playoffs.
“I thought, “Is that Jimmy trolling or is that Jimmy serious?” If you’re not on the court playing against Boston or on the court playing against the New York Knicks, you should keep your mouth shut on the criticism of those teams,” Riley said.
All in all, Butler’s future with Miami is up in the air after Pat Riley’s statements.
Miami Heat Unsure About Offering Jimmy Butler a Contract Extension
Jimmy Butler’s Season
Despite being in and out of the lineup with nagging injuries this past season, Jimmy Butler still had a solid year. He averaged 20.8 points, 1.3 steals, 5.3 total rebounds, and 5.0 assists per game. Butler also tallied a field goal shooting percentage of 49.9 percent to go along with a career-best three-point shooting percentage of 41.4 percent in 60 games played. Not to mention, the six-time All-Star averaged an offensive rating of 129, a player efficiency rating of 22.0, and a box plus/minus rating of 4.6 on the season. Butler still had an All-Star-like season, but the Heat were once again a play-in team. Without Butler in the playoffs this time, they were unable to go on another Cinderella run to the NBA Finals.
Is it Time for Miami to go Into a Rebuilding Phase?
While the Heat have two NBA Finals appearances during the Butler era, they have lost both times. On top of that, they have found themselves in the play-in two years in a row now. Miami has a dynamic duo of Jimmy Butler and Bam Adebayo, but they are flirting with “no-man’s land,” in the NBA landscape. Not good enough to be top a seed in the playoffs, but not bad enough to land a quality pick in the NBA Draft. Pat Riley seems to know this and has some hard decisions ahead of himself. If Miami continues to be a play-in team, then a rebuilding process is not out of the question. As we have seen with Pat Riley, it does not matter who you are, the Heat culture will always come first.
