Jimmy Butler’s Unwavering Leadership Is Crucial For The Miami Heat

There has never been an averse situation, at least on the basketball court, that’s rattled Jimmy Butler and the Miami Heat.

You would be hard-pressed to find another NBA player as poised and confident as Butler, even when things aren’t going his way. Despite a huge obstacle standing between him and the Larry O’Brien trophy, his demeanor would fool everyone into believing he’s the one in control of this NBA Finals matchup.

As the Denver Nuggets currently sit in the driver’s seat of this series, taking a 1-0 lead into Sunday’s Game 2, the Heat understand the challenge and what type of machine they’re up against. Not only are they facing a dynamic pick-and-roll duo in Jamal Murray and Nikola Jokić, a tandem that constantly finds new counters and ways to exploit every coverage, but they are also on the wrong side of a massive size discrepancy. Aaron Gordon provided enough evidence of that in Game 1 with his bully-ball tactics against mismatches.

The odds are stacked against Miami for a multitude of reasons. Without homecourt advantage, they now have to win four out of six games against the Western Conference’s top seed — an opponent with a +8.2 net rating so far in the playoffs. That’s more than double Miami’s point differential up to this point. It’s why FiveThirtyEight currently has Denver with an 83% chance of becoming champions.

Still, Butler doesn’t care. Nor should he.

The Heat have been in these high-stakes moments. This isn’t new to them.

And every single time, their leader is as calm and unbothered as anyone you’ll ever see. In any playoff series, Butler always deflects the credit when his team has the advantage and welcomes the criticism when they fall behind. That’s been his DNA since the Chicago days.

During Saturday’s practice, Butler absorbed the blame for his uninspiring Game 1 performance. With only 13 points on 14 shot attempts and zero trips to the free throw line, it was easily his worst outing of the 2023 playoffs.

He only drove the ball into the paint eight (!) times in the Finals opener — attempting to score twice and passing on six of those occasions.

Heading into the Finals, his playoff averages were 17.8 drives per game, 8.5 shot attempts out of those, 3.3 free throw attempts, and 6.8 passes on drives. Butler seemed to leave his scoring powers in Boston. He needs to retrieve them quickly, as that level of production will not cut it against a well-rounded Nuggets group looking for some positive regression themselves.

Does that mean Butler is about to force the issue in Game 2? Not it if means breaking the offensive flow.

“No,” he said. “I’m going to continue play the right way. I’m going to pass the ball to my shooters the way I have been playing the entire playoffs, the entire year. But yeah, I think I’ve got to be more aggressive putting pressure on the rim. I think that makes everybody’s job a lot easier. [My teammates] definitely follow suit whenever I’m aggressive on both sides of the ball. So, I have to be the one to come out and kick that off the right way, which I will, and we’ll see where we end up.”

Most people confuse “being aggressive” with taking a lot more shots individually. But there is a difference, and it’s tangible in the way Butler approaches the game. The Heat never really had a shot to win Game 1 if Butler wasn’t getting to the foul line — and you can’t expect a lot of those opportunities if you only attack eight times via drives.

Butler’s low attack numbers will certainly improve as the series goes on. Perhaps one thing the Nuggets should be concerned about is how many times Miami got their shooters open despite Butler not putting immense pressure on the rim.

Collectively, Miami shot 5-of-16 on wide open threes, defined as six feet between the shooter and nearest defender’s feet. They generated seven more than Denver. Overall, Miami probably had a B- or C+ game in terms of shot diet, but started the game so poorly that it was too difficult to make up a 24-point deficit.

It was a nightmare for Miami’s trusted snipers, Max Strus and Duncan Robinson. They combined to shoot 1-of-14 from beyond the arc. But it wasn’t for a lack of sound offensive process. For the most part, the Heat were able to stretch out Denver and get the same type of looks they did against Boston in the East Finals.

Miami was creating high-quality shots in a variety of ways:

• Spacing appropriately around Butler’s post-ups and making the extra pass once the defense collapsed in the paint
• Shooters firing off dribble handoffs to attack Denver’s drop coverage on ball-screens
• Attacking hard closeouts, and making swing-swing passes to the corner once the Nuggets were in rotation
• Using Bam Adebayo’s roll gravity to put the corner defender in tough predicaments
• Stationing the best shooters one-pass away from Butler on his drives, making it harder for Denver to send help at the nail

Seriously, look at some of these attempts off the Heat’s drive-and-kick strategy.

But, there’s thing players will tell you, even if it goes against what most coaches believe in: This is a results-based business. Teams don’t win trophies for creating the best possible looks. They don’t get remembered in history unless the ball drops through the net.

From that perspective, it can be argued the Heat already blew their opportunity. To win this series, they need to win at least one game in Denver. By not taking advantage of the Nuggets’ own offensive struggles and a poor shooting night from Michael Porter Jr., this might be the game that haunts Miami in the end.

After all, Denver has shown the ability to make defensive adjustments from game to game throughout the playoffs. The same number of open 3-pointers for Miami probably won’t be there in Game 2. And the deeper any series goes, the more each team will be dialed into the opponent’s tendencies. If the Nuggets’ defense cleans up its rotations moving forward, Miami likely missed its chance to win the ‘3-point barrage’ performance.

Even if that’s true, the Heat still have a deep offensive ‘menu’ as Erik Spoelstra likes to call it. They can still stretch the Nuggets on possessions where Butler isn’t involved.

On this double-drag action, Miami does its job perfectly — Adebayo rolls hard to the rim after slipping out, and it forces KCP to rotate to the restricted area. Once Gabe Vincent sees it, he lasers a skip pass to the weakside corner:

Again, it was a pretty design that ended ugly. Remember … results-based business.

Max Strus, the shooter in the clip above, registered the 10th playoff game in NBA history with at least 10 shot attempts without scoring a point.

Despite the rough shooting, Butler’s confidence in his teammates will never waver. Serving as Miami’s leader — vocally and through his actions — Butler is not someone who will resort to hero ball if Miami is facing a scoring drought.

When things go awry and his shooters aren’t converting, Butler will be the first one to put an arm around them and lift their spirits.

“Yeah, I need to say to them, I’m still going to throw you the ball,” he said before Saturday’s practice. “And if you miss the next ten [shots], when you’re open on that 11th one, I’m still going to throw you the ball because you’ll never be the reason why we lose. It’s always a group effort. I want you to take the same shots because they are going to be there. We are going to throw you the ball.”

Leadership comes in many different forms. After nearly 870 career games, Butler has commanded such high respect in the locker room because of his selfless nature. Through his play-style and commitment to hitting the open man, regardless of the percentages up to that point, his teammates feel empowered.

Butler knows he wouldn’t be in his second NBA Finals without Miami’s surrounding talent giving them monumental boosts versus Milwaukee, New York, and Boston. His message to the role players who simply missed open shots in Game 1 is very simple: Trust the work and stay true to what helped get Miami on this stage.

“Stay aggressive because you’ve been the reason that we have won so many games before,” Butler added. “You are going to be the reason that we win games now, and that’s never going to change. I have a lot of faith in those guys. I’m in their corner, Bam is in their corner, Coach [Spoelstra], Coach Pat [Riley], everybody. So, when everybody is in your corner, you only have one job to do: Shoot the ball.”

Kyle Lowry, the 37-year-old veteran that shares his own experiences with wild shooting variance in the playoffs, echoed those sentiments:

One critical part of Butler’s leadership is how relaxed and even-keeled he is, both as a player and personality. Although he’s aware the mountain just got steeper, he’s not going to stress about the situation.

Instead of dwelling on what’s already done, he tries his best to reset and make sure his teammates stay upbeat. Butler and some members of the Heat went to an escape room in Denver on Saturday night, just to have fun and not stress about basketball. He also mentioned a few of his teammates went to see the new “Spider-Man: Across The Spider-Verse” film before practice.

“Just doing normal stuff, because at the end of the day, I’m as normal as they come,” Butler said about his off-day activities. “It’s not always about basketball. It will never always be about basketball. That’s how I regroup. I stay consistent in that because that’s what I know I can fall back on. My [teammates], they are going to love me whether I win or lose. My daughter is going to love me whether I win or lose. So that’s what I focus on.”

Heading into Game 2, he maintains there is no reason to smash the panic button. This might be the first time Miami has trailed in a series during the playoffs, but they didn’t expect the journey to be easy.

“We’re okay, we really are,” Butler said. “We are very calm. We are very collected. We have so much confidence, still. It’s not going anywhere. We’re going to believe in one another, always, no matter what, home or away.”

Before Game 1, Butler wore a shirt with the words four more on the back, counting down the number of wins they needed for an NBA title.

The shirt is yet to be outdated. Their goal remains the same.

“And we’re still going to get four,” he said.