Former Miami Heat star Jimmy Butler is thriving with his new team, the Golden State Warriors. Across 16 games played with Golden State thus far, he’s contributing across the board. He’s averaging 16.8 points, 5.8 rebounds, 5.9 assists and 1.3 steals per game.
More importantly, the Warriors have been stacking up wins since acquiring Butler before the trade deadline.
Golden State has lost just two games with Butler in the lineup and has steadily risen up the Western Conference standings over the last month.
Whether or not the Warriors would even qualify for the play-in tournament was seemingly up in the air earlier on in the season. Now, Golden State is 10 wins above the .500 mark, and the No. 2 seed in the West is within reach.
Heat legend Udonis Haslem admitted that Butler has provided the Warriors with a shot in the arm, but he also reminded folks that the 2025 NBA Playoffs haven’t started yet.
“This is no Jimmy hate, but I will that the record has been a little bit favorable to Golden State right now,” Haslem said of the quality of the Warriors’ competition of late. “I’m looking at the record of the teams that they’ve played, and we’re talking about 312 wins to 364 losses. I would argue that some of these teams they probably could have beat without Jimmy. Now, Jimmy has given them a boost. It’s like a shot of whiskey right now, but we’ll see if it lasts throughout the playoffs.”
Butler and the Warriors saw their seven-game winning streak get snapped on Monday against a Denver Nuggets team that was missing its two best players in big man Nikola Jokic and guard Jamal Murray. Aaron Gordon picked up the slack from a scoring standpoint with Jokic and Murray sidelined, as he scored a season-high 38 points while shooting 14-of-23 from the floor and 4-of-6 from 3-point range.
The Warriors suffered an embarrassing loss, however Butler seemingly wasn’t to blame for the team coming up short. He was maybe the best player on the floor for Golden State in that game, considering he totaled team-highs in points and rebounds.
Monday marked the Warriors’ first loss since March 1, but as Haslem hinted, Golden State played plenty of subpar opponents during its winning streak. Golden State started off its winning streak with a win over the lowly Charlotte Hornets and earned victories over the Brooklyn Nets and Portland Trail Blazers during that stretch as well.
The Warriors have yet to have an opportunity to prove that they can advance deep into the playoffs with Butler in the fold, but they have two of the better playoff performers of this generation in Butler and Stephen Curry. Butler helped the Heat reach two NBA Finals earlier in the decade with his spectacular play, while Curry is a four-time NBA champion.
