Jimmy Butler came up the hard way in life and the motivation that was instilled in him through his childhood experiences has been on display throughout the NBA playoffs.
The 33-year-old has been talismanic for the un-fancied Miami Heat, leading them from the play-in game all the way to the NBA finals as the eighth seed, with the Denver Nuggets in their sights for game one on Monday night.
Butler is averaging 28.5 points, seven rebounds and 5.7 assists per game in the post-season, inspiring his team to upset the odds and overcome the Milwaukee Bucks, New York Knicks and Boston Celtics on the way to the finals.
Heading into the hotly-anticipated series against Nikola Jokic and the Nuggets, Butler was asked by ESPN and CNN reporter Rachel Nichols if there was a particular Finals series that had inspired him in his childhood.
Butler responded bluntly. “We didn’t have cable," he said, referencing the hard times he overcame in the suburbs of Houston, Texas.
Butler's father left the family home when he was an infant and he revealed in 2011 in the run-up to the NBA draft – when he was selected 30th overall by the Chicago Bears – that his mother kicked him out of the house aged 13, with no family or money to fall back on.
"I don't like the look of you, you gotta go," were her words, he told ESPN.
In the years that followed, he bounced around friends' houses before being taken in by Michelle Lambert, his friend Jordan Leslie's mother as he went into senior year of high school. She already had four children of her own with her first husband, who had died, and her second husband brought three kids with him, meaning a shortage of space and money, but she welcomed Butler into her home and he thrived.
Butler says he loathes talking about his past with his biological family, who he still has a relationship with, telling Chicago Magazine in 2015: "It's because I don't ever want that to define me. I hated it whenever it came up because that's all anybody ever wanted to talk about.
"Like, that hasn't gotten me to where I am today. I'm a great basketball player because of my work. I'm a good basketball player because of the people I have around me. And if I continue to be stuck in the past, then I won't get any better.
"I won't change, I'll get stuck as that kid. That's not who I am. I'm so far ahead of that. I don't hold grudges. I still talk to my family. My mom. My father. We love each other. That's never going to change."
Butler has shown himself to be an inspirational leader in this fairytale playoff run for the underdog Heat and although they remain unfancied against Jokic's Nuggets, Butler's team will be right behind him as game one gets underway in the Mile High City on Thursday.
