Jimmy Butler was traded to the Golden State Warriors on Wednesday night in a deal that made the NBA world collectively shrug. After the shock and awe surrounding the Luka Doncic deal, seeing Jimmy Butler finally get moved after weeks of in-fighting with the Miami Heat, it just didn't move the needle the same way.
Among those who were not impressed with the move or convinced that it would take the Warriors where they wanted to go is ESPN's Stephen A. Smith. On First Take Thursday morning he told his co-workers that this was no mega-deal. In fact, the Warriors might have just done it for financial reasons.
.@stephenasmith believes the Warriors are "no more dangerous than they were yesterday" after the Jimmy Butler trade 😅 pic.twitter.com/FNgDiR7CXn
— First Take (@FirstTake) February 6, 2025
"What we're not going to do today is call this a mega-deal," said Smith. "It is not a mega-deal. The fact of the matter is if Jimmy Butler had ended up in Phoenix with Kevin Durant and Devin Booker, that would have been a mega-deal. But him being in Golden State? You gotta understand something. We're accostumed to seeing Steph Curry with Klay Thompson. Jimmy Butler's not a Klay Thompson caliber player, type of player rather. He's big time. He's playoff Jimmy. He will produce. His numbers go up every series in the playoffs, everybody. No doubt about that and we know that he's big time and he's an All-Star caliber player. I'm just saying in terms of this system, who he's playing with, the personel surrounding Jimmy. No, this is not a mega-deal. This is something that got the Golden State Warriors about $19.3 million under the luxury tax and its saving them money. It's a business deal."
While Butler got the Miami Heat to the Eastern Conference Finals three times in four years, he completely missed the 2024 postseason and at 35 years old, generally misses a quarter or more of the regular season every year. Golden State is currently in 11th place in the Western Conference.
The good news is that Butler should be well-rested from all of his suspensions earlier this season.
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This article was originally published on www.si.com as Stephen A. Smith: Jimmy Butler Trade More Business Deal Than Mega-Deal for Warriors.
