The New Orleans Pelicans, who currently own the second-worst record in the Western Conference at 12-36, have interest in Miami Heat star Jimmy Butler, according to Jake Fischer of The Stein Line.
“A new team has emerged as a potential trade suitor for Jimmy Butler,” he said. “The New Orleans Pelicans have this week registered interest in trading for Butler, league sources tell The Stein Line.”
Fischer noted that the extent as to which the Pelicans have interest is unknown, though the Pelicans would have a deal built around Brandon Ingram’s expiring $36 million deal.
”Butler is making $48.8M this season compared to Ingram’s $36M,” Fischer wrote. “Meaning New Orleans would likely have to add multiple lower-salaried players to any deal & involve an extra team(s) as a facilitator to make the cap math work & prevent their tax bill from increasing in the process.”
Ingram has not played since Dec. 7 due to an ankle sprain. He has played in only 18 games this season, averaging 22.2 points, 5.6 rebounds and 5.2 assists per game, shooting 46.5 percent from the floor and 37.4 percent from 3-point range.
Ingram has dealt with multiple injuries over his career, though he had the healthiest season since his rookie year in 2023-24. He played in 64 games, averaging 20.8 points, 5.1 boards and 5.7 assists per game.
The Pelicans have been injury-riddled throughout the entirety of the season—the biggest reason why they have only won 12 games. Should Fischer’s report be true, aiming for Butler would be perplexing—though Ingram would be one of the best players the Heat can get back at this stage.
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“If we’re being brutally honest, no matter what, nothing I do now is going to get me paid any more money. Even though I don’t care about the money. All-NBA, dah, dah, dah, dah, none of that is going to matter. I’m at a point right now that I got more than enough money. I’m just here to win.”
~ Jimmy Butler (October 2024) ~
Jimmy Butler has earned over $312 million in his NBA career. When his 2024-25 and 2025-2026 contract amounts are added in, he will have earned over $415 million. This does not include his endorsement deals worth over $12 million per year, his income from Big Face Coffee and Youtube (800,000 subscribers). In 2024, Forbes ranked Butler as the 31st highest-paid athlete in the world.
For someone who will have earned over half a billion dollars (that’s $500,000,000) before all is said and done, he sure does seem to be hung up on money, regardless what he has said previously.
The newest report on this ongoing Jimmy saga is that the Suns are cooling on the trade idea. So, where does this leave us? Maybe it is more good news than bad because that trade never made much sense and looking elsewhere has always been the better option. But, it also leaves open the possibility that Jimmy won’t get moved. Let’s hope that doesn’t come to pass.
steve kerr says he needs help.
He does. That team is similar in strength to ours when we had Butler, a play-in team at best, and even if that goes well, a likely first round exiter. With Butler they could go farther and there is some urgency there as Curry is starting to undergo the early aging process, and Green is getting older too. That makes sense except trading Wiggins or whatever they send back will lessen the help Butler brings. My guess is they will decide against it also. Like you said in a previous post, who would want to assume the risks and costs associated with Jimmy? The need to send players back will stop most of the play-in level teams. And other teams who could do it using mostly draft picks, don’t seem interested. My guess is we are stuck with him and the let him walk scenario. Still, hoping for the best.
It’s back to Warriors vs Suns in the Jimmy Bowl per Shams. The “reporting” on this has been hilarious
Buffalo Springfield – “Nobody’s right if everybody’s wrong.”
Question for the HH Commentary:
The HHH Banner shows 6 Heat jersey numbers retired. Zo, Tim Hardaway, Shaq, Bosh, Wade, and Udonis. I think it’s safe to say that LeBron will also be up there. If Jimmy Butler gets his jersey retired, that makes 8.
Where does Jimmy Butler rank among those top-8? I have him behind Wade, LeBron, and Zo as a no-brainer. I once had him 4th, but after this latest spat, I have him behind Bosh and tied with Shaq. I still have him ahead of Tim Hardaway as a no brainer. And I put him ahead of Udonis, but could be convinced to change my mind.
What do you think?
My order: Wade, UD, Zo, Lebron, Shaq, Bosh, Hardaway, Butler.
whoa! behind Hardaway even? I’ll just say that Timmy had a ‘checkered past’, and the Shaq exit was not pretty. I don’t put UD in the top-5 but I respect it.
For me I would go wade, zo,lebron,bosh, ud, butler, shaq, Hardaway.
In my list he’s behind mike miller lol
Hardaway took us from zero to the conference finals (alongside Zo, who obviously gets the higher ranking). To me, that’s more impressive than taking an already-established team to the finals, even if it was struggling a bit before he got there.
As for Shaq, he’s the reason that Miami became a destination team. Like, we were a respected franchise before then, even if we were re-building in the Eddie Jones years, but the moment that Shaq showed up, we were immediately right up there with NBA royalty. He does lose points for basically everything he did after the chip. But I don’t think Lebron and Bosh come to Miami if Shaq doesn’t do it first.
I genuinely don’t think Jimmy will have a lasting legacy for this team. I think he was essentially a mercenary for hire, and he gave us some great seasons while he was here, but the moment he’s gone that’s the end of his story in Miami. Zo is still with us. UD is still with us. Wade came back. Shaq helped us get our first ring. LeBron helped us get two more. Bosh was also an essential part of those championships. And listen, Hardaway is and always has been an absolute knuckle-head, right up there with Gummies-on-an-Airplane McGillicutty and Trying-to-Get-My-2K-Rating-Up McGee in terms of saying and doing stupid things. But the man was among the best at what he did, and he helped lay the foundation for everything that’s come after.
Now the Warriors are back in the rumor mill as well. Are the Lakers next? Is DeAaron Fox still in the mix?
Last year I skipped work on trade deadline day, but unfortunately that won’t be possible this year. I’m hoping the Heat don’t drag this out until the last minute, but it’s starting to look that way…
The back-and-forth rumors of X team interested is funny. The NBA media is dying for a trade to actually happen. When it finally happens, we’ll see several within 24 hours.
Feels like one of those years when nothing is going to happen until deadline day, and then a bunch of people are going to get traded in the last 24-hours
Jimmy Butler is a cancer that must be removed in order for the team to stabilize, recalibrate and move on to the next phase. At this point, Fox, Ingram, Williamson, LaVine, Wiggins, Porter, De’Andre Hunter, RJ Barrett, Cam Johnson, DeRozan, Miles Bridges, Dejounte Murray, Vucevic and Ball, Middleton and Portis, somebody… anybody but Beal.
Definitely some good news I can get behind, having Ingram would be big. He could potentially be our new sf for the long haul, if all the stars align. Not gonna lie tho is injury history concerns me, but I think his contract expires after this season. Also I feel like if he plays well here, he could possibly get an extension with injury stipulations attached, so if doesn’t play a certain amount of games he could lose money. Also he’s still just 27, 6’8, with a lot of length, former 2nd pick. Lastly he fits with the young guy timeliness, and I feel like heat culture can turn his career around.
Consensus here is to hate Jimmy? Why?
Cuz he brung this on himself, acting like baby, getting paid top dollar, but still wanting more, when his play doesn’t warrant that, among continuous missed games. Quitting on team, Missing team flights, staying in different hotels/mansions 30 miles away from the team. He has been professional, he doesn’t really want to win, he just wants money, his greed, and ego won’t allow him to take a paycut. When he’s making money from big head coffee, shoe deals, commercials, music, etc. He did this to 3 other teams…. need I say more?
Hate is too strong a word to use. Strongly dislike is probably a better term. Most Heat fans appreciate the team’s accomplishments during Butler’s tenure. What Heat fans strongly dislike is his arrogance, selfishness, insensitivity, lack of effort and feelings of entitlement. Butler has been guilty of all those things, and more, during the past two seasons.
To quote Davey Crockett, Jimmy Butler has gotten “too big for his britches.” This term refers to behaving as if you are more important than you really are or becoming so “swollen” with conceit that your pants or boots no longer fit.
Butler’s immaturity and stubbornness are two other negative personal characteristics that Miami fans had not seen much of until recently, since his arrival in 2019. These are traits that he had demonstrated in his previous stops in Chicago, Minnesota, and Philadelphia.
So, the bottom line is Miami fans don’t hate Jimmy Butler. We’re just tired of his primadonna bullshit and want him to go away. In closing, a final message to Butler from Miami Heat fans: “Don’t let the door hit you in the @$$ on the way out of town Jimmy.”
Agreed, I don’t hate him, just think it could’ve been handled better.
I agree. All the way around. That’s what happens when two stubborn, egotistical men get into a pissing contest. Both are too proud to admit when they are wrong.
Was Riley really wrong? How is it wrong to want the guy asking for $50 million a year to play more than the 50-60-something games he plays? Oh no he said it out loud. The horror! Ya know?
Yeah, maybe Riley could have been more diplomatic. But let’s not forget that prior to Riley’s statement, Butler made 2 public idiotic statements about the Celtics and the Knicks. I was glad Riley called him out.
I was happy he called him out then too. The mistakes were made before that and after. They were about leniency, about placating. Before, he allowed Jimmy to run the show, have different privileges than any other teammates. He also made a bad trade that really hurt us at Jimmy’s insistence. And the revisionism that somehow Lowry helped us the first year, well he helped a little more than hurt, but not at a cost to not be able to have the freedom to make other moves. And after the first year I don’t think anyone can say Lowry didn’t hurt us way more than helped and had a bad attitude beyond his limited availability and uninspired play. The other mistake was riding with Jimmy into this season instead of trading him like everyone here was asking for. Now he’s worth approximately half as much. I also think he should not deal with Phoenix if you don’t want the return and otherwise the deal is so complex and we end up paying the helping teams. There may be better deals and it’s hard to know why Riley went into placating Jimmy mode again or at least he was in it when he first suspended Jimmy. Then Riley toughened up again with the suspensions, but you can’t break the rules for one player and then try to put it all back in the bottle. .When you are not consistent, then things like this blow up in everyone’s face. Butler is culpable of so much of this but Riley handled it very poorly.
Would any of you, if you were GM, allow a player to travel without the team, stay at different hotels, and other forms of favoritistic treatment? You can appreciate Jimmy all you want, and we did, and he was paid amazingly well, but he is also supposed to be a teammate and a team player. Riley let the whole organization down by allowing this to happen and may have even brought on some of Butler’s entitled behavior.
One more thing and I promise I will stop hammering Riley after this one more thing. Here it is, even though Jimmy is an avaricious, greedy dude, part of this issue was definitely the GM not providing adequate support, particularly this offseason. A whole offseason and we acquire Alex Burks, are you kidding? We go into the season with either Bam having to play center or using Love and Bryant at that position and pretending that we had all we needed, are you kidding me? Some blame for this whole fiasco is associated with lack of support, no getting around it.
Ok, I am done. I promise.
Lol, having a Hemingway moment here. Anyway, Herro – $29 million, Bam – $35 million, Butler – $49 million, Rozier – $25 million, Duncan – $19 million. That’s $157 million. Not counting the other 9 players .The 2024-2025 salary cap is $141 million. My point all along has been that it is nearly impossible to add the type of players who would be major contributors without trading 2-3 of those top 5.
Riley gave him special treatment/privileges and spoiled him rotten. When Butler acted up like the spoiled brat that Riley had created, Riley called him out publicly. Riley would have been better off calling Butler into his office and having a man-to-man conversation about expectations, potential rewards and potential penalties. That didn’t happen. The rest is history. If parents spoil the shit out of their kids and the kids grow up to be selfish, insensitive, greedy, spoiled, assholes as adults, who is at fault?
its to bad it has gotten this bad cause he sounds like a smart guy .w/o jimmy the last 4 -5 years are mediocrity.pats taking shots at jimmy are wrong to.jimmys reaction to pats comments are totally unacceptable.at this stage he must be traded asap.what an unprofessional immature behavior he has exhibited.why some team would want him now im not sure.hes a part time super star father time is undefeated.lets just get this over and concentrate on our bright future please just start bam ware and jovic terry and ty,cant have ty and dunc on floor together
Is that really true here? I don’t hate Butler at all, but I do hate this situation and how he has made it worse by his words and actions. If he really wanted out, he’d be okay with any trade as he would only have to be there only about 3 more months! Afterwards, he could opt out and choose to go to any team he wants to as a free agent. I am not saying that management is totally innocent and all of this, but I find it ironic that both he and LeBron had their greatest success with the Heat.
I can only speak for myself. I don’t hate Jimmy. I think he’s a top-6 Heat player of all time, maybe higher. I think that bubble run was one of my favorite moments of sports fandom ever. I hope to see his number in the rafters one day.
But I also think the writing was on the wall at the end of last season. It was pretty clear he was playing at half speed from the start of this season. And it’s pretty obvious that he’s been an absolute cancer on this team for the past couple months.
So do I hate Jimmy? No.
But I do I want Jimmy off this team asap? Absolutely.
Not really, but he need a lesson.
If he is traded to a bad team, and have no offers for extension next year, the lesson should be painful enough to learn something from that. For example, that money is not everything.
Otherwise, I wish him all the best.
No hate. But a lot of frustration. If a child is grounded, that doesn’t mean the parents hate them. It just means that the parent sees negative behavior and has enacted an appropriate discipline.
As others have noted, Jimmy has been acting like an unrepentant spoiled child. I will always appreciate what he’s done for this team, but I don’t want to see that kind of behavior rewarded.
It’s weird that people overlook what he’s doing to the team RIGHT NOW. The Heat are missing a $50 million dollar player because he wants to play stupid games. And for those that say the front office has blame then why did Jimmy not do this right after Pat said what he said? It was the summer; his value was high, and the Heat could have worked something out with another team a lot easier. You know why? Because Jimmy was planning to use the season to maintain his value, probably at the cost of other players progressing, then was going to bounce right after the season and ask for a trade, but when he realized Herro was now getting the stats he threw a fit knowing what Pat said is a popular thought across the NBA. Not only that, but he knew the Heat were going to get a good return on him and he just can’t allow that. So now his team is struggling to maintain playoff position because of him AGAIN. Same crap last year and his karma got him injured in the play-in game. We end up going against the 1 seed without him. He shows a pattern of really not caring about his teammates or the team.
He was amazing when he was locked in, but since last year he’s coasting on name recognition alone and not because he’s playing like a guy worth $50 million.
Everything is true, but at the end of the day, that’s the most fun heat team in years, and the future is bright with our young players.
There is 50 mill sitting at home instead of being on the court, yes, but those 50 mill played like 100 two and 4 years ago, 20 last year, 2 this year, and will play like 20 next year somewhere else, not in Miami.
Trading him for anything would be a clear win for Heat.
Hm, based on that, we should thanks to Jimmy to be himselves.
I like that second to last paragraph. That is a good synopsis. He will play like a 20 million player next year, somewhere else. He’ll be worth 30 million when he’s on the court, but overall ten million less due to unavailability. And those values will drop the following year. In short, someone will likely regret the signing monetarily, but maybe he could take a Golden State this year on a deep drive into the playoffs. That is where he should go.
I like Alvarado.
Can we get him along.
I hope we can get him too, he helps us with a need at pg, scrappy 3&d player, POA defender, shooting a career high 42 percent from 3. Plus having him here would be GTA: vice city edition lol
Only if we bring back Bryant, hahahaha!
????
That’s who he had the fight with
Barry Jackson: As my pal and colleague
@Anthony_Chiang
said, as of midway through this week, only Phoenix had made a firm offer for Butler. You can’t say “trade him” if no offers. Warriors have inquired. Pelicans initial discussion went nowhere. Heat hopes something surfaces by next Thursday
And no doubt Phoenix’s firm offer was Beal for Butler lol.
We still have about a week left. Notice no major moves yet. Everyone appears to be waiting for this domino to fall, pun intended
Pelicans are under .300. Make this trade happen. I don’t care if we end up with Zion instead of Ingram. Put Jimmy on a hopeless team.
The whipsawing us around has commenced. Hopefully one of the rumors will be true. Ingram, when healthy, is a good player, a starter. I was surprised when I saw he is only 27. He would help but health could be an issue.
The 11th hour always makes butts move.
I think he’s too much of a stoner to survive in the Heat organziation. I’m getting strong Michael Beasley vibes. But I’ll take him as a 1-year rental with an expiring contract
Exactly. When healthy he can help more this year than any of the other options. Wiggins would be second, but that deal doesn’t expire when we want.
Kinda a weird take. Is he known for smoking a lot of weed?
You gotta see, aside from the injuries, a player who has worked hard to improve his game in ways that contribute to winning. While being on teams that all seemed like they couldn’t wait to trade him, or trade for someone else to minimize his role.
Maybe an organization that prioritizes team success would be a breathe of fresh air to him. Wind under his sails.
Well, I’m not a reporter. I’ve never met Brandon Ingram. Realistically, I have no idea how he spends his free time.
But I’ve watched a lot of NBA players over the years. I’ve hungout with a lot of stoners. And I’ve smoked my fair share.
I’ll just repeat that Ingram gives me strong Michael Beasley vibes.
Like Prince singing to Sheena Easton… Brandon Ingram “Got the Look”.
Now he.’s one of my favorites. Isn’t everyone a stoner these days, especially up there.
This is the one! Plus, Jimmy gets to go to a true title contender. JK HA MF’er!
seats to sb ?
heck yeah. Ingram, Herb Jones, and Alvarado for Butler. LFG!