Jimmy Butler has been suspended indefinitely by the Miami Heat in the latest twist in one of the more dramatic public feuds between player and team in recent NBA history. The drama began at the end of last season, when team president Pat Riley admitted his reluctance to give Butler a contract extension given his injury issues. It dragged into the season, which has now featured three suspensions, multiple trade requests, and a now-laughable press release in which Riley claimed the Heat would not be trading Butler.
That’s how we got here. The real question, with the trade deadline 10 days away and no solution in sight, is where we are going. Given the way this has gone thus far, making a prediction seems foolish, so that’s not what we’re going to do here. Instead, we’re going to look at every possible outcome and what it will take to make it reality.
Some of these outcomes are not only feasible, but could come in the very near future. Others? Well… Butler technically has a year-and-a-half left on his contract, so he could drag this thing out quite a bit if he was so inclined. There’s no telling which solution winds up coming to fruition, but when the dust eventually settles here, one of the following scenarios will come to pass.
Path 1: Butler gets traded to the Suns by Feb. 6
If Butler has his way, this is how things will play out. Phoenix has been by far the most aggressive pursuer of Butler on the trade market. He and Kevin Durant have been interested in a partnership in the past, as the Heat were a preferred destination of Durant’s when he was seeking a deal away from the Brooklyn Nets. Most importantly, the Suns are positioned to give Butler the contract extension he seeks. Phoenix has already shown complete disregard for the second apron. What does it matter to them if they have to pay Butler for an extra year?
Of course, if it were as easy as agreeing to a trade, Butler would probably be a Sun right now. Obviously, he isn’t, and Bradley Beal is the single biggest reason for that. While the Suns are seemingly open to paying Butler, nobody has much interest in paying Beal supermax money for the next two seasons. Even if the did, Beal, through his no-trade clause, has the right to block any trade the Suns present him with. Clearing one of these obstacles would be doable. Clearing both is going to be a challenge. For that reason, a Phoenix trade is unlikely.
The Suns have no other viable path to getting Butler. Beal, Durant or Devin Booker have to be in the trade for it to be legal. The Suns cannot aggregate salaries as a second-apron team, and they cannot take in more money than they send out as a first-apron team. That means, in essence, that they need to trade one of the three players on their roster earning more than Butler is now, and two of those players, Durant and Booker, are seemingly untouchable. Without Beal, there is no deal.
Even with him, a trade is no guarantee. The Suns may now have three tradable first-round picks, but none of those picks are especially desirable. The 2025 pick will almost certainly come from the Cleveland Cavaliers and wind up in one of the final two slots of the round. The other two are tied to three teams and convey as the worst available pick in those seasons. With those three picks, and possibly rookie Ryan Dunn, the Suns not only need to get the Heat to agree to send them Beal, but in all likelihood, pay off multiple teams to absorb salaries (including Beal’s). Maybe the Suns can find a viable solution in the next 10 days, but the odds are against them.
Jimmy Butler mock trades: Suns in position for blockbuster, but they’ll need help from Bucks and others
Sam Quinn
Path 2: Butler gets traded to another team by Feb. 6
The reporting surrounding Butler’s enthusiasm for teams besides the Suns has been somewhat inconsistent. At one point we heard he was directly telling certain teams not to trade for him. At another it was “anybody but the Heat.” At another it was “anybody but the Heat or the Grizzlies.” Butler has the leverage to be picky. With a player option, he can theoretically leave any team that trades for him after the season. Even if he doesn’t, the whole world has seen what happens when Butler plays for a team he doesn’t want to be on. Nobody is willingly walking through that door.
Of course, leverage can be temporary. That could explain why the Heat have been so quick to suspend Butler this season. Let’s say a Suns trade is either impossible from a practical perspective or generates so little value to the Heat that it would undesirable. What’s the best way to get Butler to warm up to another destination? By making him so miserable in Miami that he’ll do anything to get out.
We don’t know that this is happening, of course, but given how Suns-centric these negotiations have been, it does at least behoove the Heat to try to open up the market a bit. The Grizzlies are a perfect example of why the Heat could use more flexibility out of their outgoing star. It makes sense why Butler wouldn’t want to play for Memphis: the Grizzlies need to save their money in the 2026-27 season for a new Jaren Jackson Jr. contract, and that means Butler almost definitely wouldn’t get his extension. Yet the Grizzlies have much more draft capital to offer the Heat in a deal along with far more desirable salary. If the Heat need to get Butler to warm up to the idea of going to Memphis, a third suspension might be a step in that direction.
Even if Pat Riley isn’t quite that Machiavellian, a one-team market does little for the Heat. Whether Monday’s suspension had anything to do with this or not, the Heat would probably prefer to trade Butler somewhere other than Phoenix, and the longer the Suns go without constructing a deal, the likelier such a trade becomes.
Path 3: Butler makes peace with the Heat, now or later
Let’s say Feb. 6 comes and goes without a trade. Is reconciliation possible? Well… there’s at least some precedent. Retracted trade requests used to be a bit more common. Hakeem Olajuwon, Scottie Pippen and Kobe Bryant stand out as stars who have tried to force trades, failed and ultimately returned to their teams. All three wound up winning championships after the fact. But the league has changed quite a bit since then. The most recent example of a retracted trade request was LaMarcus Aldridge, who wanted out of San Antonio in 2017 but wound up staying until 2021.
The characters involved in that feud were a bit more humble than Butler and Riley. “As discussions went on, it became apparent to me it was me,” Gregg Popovich said in 2018. Neither Butler nor Riley are known for admitting fault. There’s not an obvious compromise here either. Riley isn’t handing out an extension to make peace. Butler certainly won’t come off of the bench.
Maybe the Heat can play the suspension game for the rest of the season. For reasons we will discuss shortly, it doesn’t make much sense for Butler to opt out of his contract this summer, so let’s say he picks that option up and no trade materializes. Could the two sides agree to meet in the middle, allow Butler to return to the starting lineup for the 2025-26 season and part amicably afterward? It’s not likely, but nobody benefits from another year of this mess. Butler has to prove to future employers that he is capable of playing nice. Riley needs to show stars he might one day recruit that Heat Culture is not inherently unfriendly to players and that the Butler situation was salvageable. Perhaps cooler heads prevail and both parties act within their self interest. Don’t bet on it, but hey, it’s the NBA, so anything is possible.
Path 4: Butler opts out of his contract of his contract in June
If Butler wants out of Miami, all he needs to do is opt out of his contract this offseason and become an unrestricted free agent. At that point, he will be free to sign with any team, including Phoenix. The catch is that he’d only be able to sign for a team’s cap space or into one of their cap exceptions. For Phoenix, that would mean signing for the minimum. His prospects aren’t much brighter anywhere else.
As of right now, the only team projected to have max cap space available this offseason is the Brooklyn Nets. The Nets are in the middle of a rebuild and are unlikely to pay a veteran like Butler top dollar. Other rebuilding teams like the Wizards and Hornets are expected to have meaningful but sub-max cap space, and even they can’t come close to Butler’s max. Among teams with a real chance to win next season, the pickings are slim. Both the Spurs and the Rockets can theoretically operate below the cap if they want, but it would be inadvisable for them to do so because it would mean letting internal free agents go. Both will have draft picks to sign as well.
In all likelihood, if Butler reaches free agency, he would be seeking a sign-and-trade. As sign-and-trades automatically hard-cap the acquiring team at the first apron, few teams could even afford to bring him in at the price he is likely hoping for. If Butler were to opt out, he’d almost certainly be taking a significant pay cut, and he wouldn’t be doing it with an obvious landing spot in place. At this point, an opt out seems inadvisable no matter how badly Butler wants to leave Miami.
Path 5: Butler opts into his contract, gets traded in June
Things can change quickly in the playoffs. Perhaps there are teams who aren’t currently interested in Butler that could change their tune following a disappointing playoff outcome. We’re at an especially vulnerable point in NBA history right now. Think of how many stars have reportedly been on the verge of trade requests this season, like Giannis Antetokounmpo and De’Aaron Fox. Their teams might reconsider if their postseasons go poorly. While Golden State obviously isn’t trading Stephen Curry, perhaps its desperation level rises following a disappointing end to this season.
Only one team gets to hoist the trophy at the end of the season. Everyone else spends the summer trying to figure out how to get there, and more importantly, how to prevent their stars from getting upset about not having gotten there already. Teams that may currently be locked out of the Butler sweepstakes by the aprons could potentially be freer over the summer as well. Phoenix will still be a second-apron team, but Milwaukee and Minnesota both have paths out from under it.
So sure, it is possible that the market materially changes by June. If Butler is willing to play out next season on a one-year deal then all the better. But the longer this drags out, the less valuable Butler is in a trade. Remember, any team trading for him now gets him for the 2025 postseason. Getting him in the 2025 offseason means getting a version of him that’s one year older and has at least one fewer chance to bring you a championship. The Heat know this, and that’s why they’ll press to find a trade now.
Path 6: Butler opts into his contract, continues feuding with Heat
Butler wants to keep getting paid. Without a trade and an extension, an opt-in is his best bet. That could very easily mean staying with the Heat next season. So, what happens then?
Well, the Heat could treat Butler as the Houston Rockets once treated John Wall: by paying him to go away. While this could affect Miami’s reputation among players and cost the Heat wins on the floor next season, there is no direct rule against this. Teams aren’t obligated to use their best or most expensive players. This would just directly oppose the ethos Riley has spent so many decades building in Miami. He’s not going to want to send the message that misbehavior is rewarded with pay.
More likely, we’d see more attempts out of the Heat to suspend Butler. In those cases, lost pay would be potentially recoupable for Butler through arbitration (as was the case for Ben Simmons, as Bobby Marks notes). This creates a different sort of problem. The Heat aren’t going to want this circus to last for another year. If there is a possible reconciliation on the table, that is why it makes sense for them. The idea of continuing the feud just hurts everyone involved.
