Coach Erik Spoelstra admitted Wednesday that the months-long drama involving Jimmy Butler brought “turbulent waters” to the Heat, writes Anthony Chiang of The Miami Herald. Butler was a distraction during the first half of the season, becoming unhappy when the team was unwilling to give him a contract extension and team president Pat Riley challenged him to be available for more regular season games. Butler publicly feuded with management and was suspended three times before being sent to Golden State shortly before the trade deadline.
Speaking at today’s exit interviews, Tyler Herro said the Butler situation was a distraction in the locker room.
“I think it was just the overall wondering when is it going to end,” Herro said. “That was kind of the main thing of when can we just focus on basketball? That’s what this profession is, it’s basketball. That’s what we’re here to do and that’s what we all get paid to do is play basketball. At the end of the day, that’s what we wanted to worry about.”
The Heat’s season didn’t get better after Butler was gone, as they posted a 12-21 record following the trade and suffered through a 10-game losing streak in March. They were able to win eight of their last 12 regular season games and made history by becoming the first 10th seed to advance through the play-in tournament, but the season crashed to an end with a first-round sweep by Cleveland and 37- and 53-point losses in their two home playoff games.
“When I say it’s a memorable season, the memories will be like the last four weeks,” Spoelstra said. “The rest of the season was a grind. But we finally started to turn the corner even during the losing streak and you felt momentum, you felt progress, you felt like everybody was coming together and it led to two play-in games. … All the other adversities, it made me better. I’ve never been in a situation like that, to try to keep a locker room together and to try to handle it during those weeks. But then also to fully change course stylistically in how to play and what to emphasize at the All-Star break. That was an invigorating challenge.”
There’s more from Miami:
- Bam Adebayo talked about the need for changes after Game 4, but he declined to get into specifics while speaking with reporters today, Chiang and Barry Jackson add in a separate story. “That’s more of a Pat Riley question,” Adebayo said. “I hope you can ask that question to him and he doesn’t blow you off. He knows how much I want to win. We want to be in the best way possible to do that. After he talks to you, he will probably talk to me and we will figure out what happens.”
- Kevin Love confirms that he intends to continue playing next season, according to Tim Reynolds of The Associated Press (Twitter link). The 36-year-old big man, who has one year left on his contract at $4.15MM, missed 22 games this year while caring for his ailing father, former NBA player Stan Love, who passed away over the weekend.
- Nikola Jovic will represent Serbia and Pelle Larsson will play for Sweden at this summer’s EuroBasket (Twitter links from Reynolds).