How Good is Jimmy Butler?

[MrFortune3]

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What really sad about this...all 3 of them said something was wrong with the culture, challenged it and got moved out of town.

[TheJordanRule]

This is probably as far as he goes without a genuine #1 or #2 as his side kick.

True. How do you get to this point with with a 2b in Adebayo and a couple of #3s? Completely crazy.

Whatever a 2b is, Bam has gotta be a deluxe version of that, as he's averaging 18/11/5 in the playoffs on high efficiency and with great defense. I'd rather have him than any center in the East, with Embiid being too much of a ball stopper and Vucevic not having the defensive presence.

Point well made. Maybe Bam's numbers and defensive presence speak for themselves. The only caveat I have is that Bam just barely morphed into this type of player this season. I mean, where was all the talk about the greatness of Bam in the 2018-2019 season? There might have been some whispers about Bam's greatness back then, but now the idea that he's great has finally reached the mainstream... and it may not have reached the mainstream if they didn't make it deep into the playoffs. And, to play the devil's advocate, what makes you think Bam's performance isn't similar to another guy everyone raved about after a great showing in the playoffs-- Pascal Siakam? Siakam was a huge part of Toronto's NBA championship run, and he appeared to be a "deluxe" version of a 2b. There was plenty of speculation that Siakam was a star in the making-- he's young, he played mad defense, he demonstrated incredible shooting range and passing ability for a big, but the sad fact is that Siakam never lived up to the billing after Kawhi left.

[dice]

It’s too bad that AK was not around when Jimmy Butler, Derrick Rose, Joakim Noah, and Luol Deng were with the Bulls...Things would’ve been different.

you realize that those guys were all here in the first place because of pax, right?

[dice]

we had the best player on a finals team in his prime and never even tried to build around him

remarkable!

What about that time we tried to build a team to clog the interior as much as possible, were too old for defense, and then acquired Cam Payne at the deadline?

We were trying to get younger and more athletic too! Hahaha.

Just to play devil's advocate, would I be wrong to say that Jimmy has improved as a leader? He's already been the best player on 3 teams before signing with the Heat, 2 of those were highly talented and had high expectations and all of those he left on bad terms. His reputation as a leader was shot, fair or not.

he's always been a good leader to those willing to be led by him

[dice]

we had the best player on a finals team in his prime and never even tried to build around him

remarkable!

What about that time we tried to build a team to clog the interior as much as possible, were too old for defense, and then acquired Cam Payne at the deadline?

The 16-17 Bulls were the anti 19-20 NBA Finalist Heat lmao. Instead of surrounding Butler with shooters, GarPax played him next to Rondo, Wade, Taj, and RoLo

And then they doubled down by sending McDermott, Taj, AND a 2nd round pick for Joffrey Lauvergne, Anthony Morrow, and Cam Payne because they identified him to be the PG of the future.

Wow, they were so so bad at their jobs.

if we count this season as the last for pax as a primary player acquisition decision maker, and in the interest of fairness we discard the team's performance in his first year at the helm, he finished with a .517 winning percentage over 16 seasons. that's hardly "so bad" at his job. and it's pretty easy to argue that he was dragged down by gar's job performance as well

so, "garpax" was a failure. but paxson himself was not

[MrSparkle]

What about that time we tried to build a team to clog the interior as much as possible, were too old for defense, and then acquired Cam Payne at the deadline?

The 16-17 Bulls were the anti 19-20 NBA Finalist Heat lmao. Instead of surrounding Butler with shooters, GarPax played him next to Rondo, Wade, Taj, and RoLo

And then they doubled down by sending McDermott, Taj, AND a 2nd round pick for Joffrey Lauvergne, Anthony Morrow, and Cam Payne because they identified him to be the PG of the future.

Wow, they were so so bad at their jobs.

if we count this season as the last for pax as a primary player acquisition decision maker, and in the interest of fairness we discard the team's performance in his first year at the helm, he finished with a .517 winning percentage over 16 seasons. that's hardly "so bad" at his job. and it's pretty easy to argue that he was dragged down by gar's job performance as well

so, "garpax" was a failure. but paxson himself was not

I mean... a 4-year build-up with the young emerging core to the miserable 2007/08 season? What a terrible let-down. Even with the lucky Rose break, the fact that none of the original Pax core (besides Deng) stuck around for the better Thibs seasons... isn't that essentially a failure? These guys were young too.

Three top-7 picks (Kirk, Ben, Tyrus) and prized rookie pickups (Duhon, Noc) were eventually dumped or walked for cap-space (even costing the 10 FRP in Kirk's case, even being affected by Noc/Salmons from the MIL swap down). His mid-1st picks (Thabo, JJ) were busts. Gar atleast picked up the slack with the Taj, Asik drafts and filled out the bench mob in free agency. His prized FA Wallace was dumped for toxic players who needed to be re-dumped or bought out.

A whole lot of high-asset busts. And yes Deng and Noah were fantastic chippers for 2-3 years, but total 1st-round exits without Rose, meaning in the 5 years Pax built before Rose, he didn't really managed to get 1 player who was even a legitimate #2 or 3 option on a contender. Unless you want to argue that Deng or Noah were capable of being #3 options on a champ (I don't think they ever were - ya need to be able to create a basket for yourself).

Pax was a failure as a GM. I do credit him for that initial 04/05 team though. Atleast until Curry and Deng sat out the rest of their seasons with health issues, that team was a pleasure to watch. Noc was a great pickup. It was never meant to last since Davis, Othella and Piatkowski were 1 foot out of retirement. The magic of that team was the 1-12 comradery. Obviously not a recipe for building in the NBA since 1/2 the team was gone within 2 years.

The 06/07 team was just a terribly mis-evaluated squad. It was forever ago, but I still remember this quote from the Zen Master from a pre-game interview: https://basketball.realgm.com/wiretap/180689/Phil-Jackson-Bulls-Like-A-Latte Couldn't have said it better. In the end, Paxson was building a house of cards.

[dice]

The 16-17 Bulls were the anti 19-20 NBA Finalist Heat lmao. Instead of surrounding Butler with shooters, GarPax played him next to Rondo, Wade, Taj, and RoLo

And then they doubled down by sending McDermott, Taj, AND a 2nd round pick for Joffrey Lauvergne, Anthony Morrow, and Cam Payne because they identified him to be the PG of the future.

Wow, they were so so bad at their jobs.

if we count this season as the last for pax as a primary player acquisition decision maker, and in the interest of fairness we discard the team's performance in his first year at the helm, he finished with a .517 winning percentage over 16 seasons. that's hardly "so bad" at his job. and it's pretty easy to argue that he was dragged down by gar's job performance as well

so, "garpax" was a failure. but paxson himself was not

I mean... a 4-year build-up with the young emerging core to the miserable 2007/08 season? What a terrible let-down. Even with the lucky Rose break, the fact that none of the original Pax core (besides Deng) stuck around for the better Thibs seasons... isn't that essentially a failure? These guys were young too.

this has been discussed ad nauseum, but the "lucky rose break" actually COST the team wins in the long run. derrick ended up getting a boatload of money for 2 terrific regular seasons, basically

Pax was a failure as a GM

then so are most GMs. if you want to say that most GMs are "so bad" at their jobs, that's your prerogative

[MrSparkle]

if we count this season as the last for pax as a primary player acquisition decision maker, and in the interest of fairness we discard the team's performance in his first year at the helm, he finished with a .517 winning percentage over 16 seasons. that's hardly "so bad" at his job. and it's pretty easy to argue that he was dragged down by gar's job performance as well

so, "garpax" was a failure. but paxson himself was not

I mean... a 4-year build-up with the young emerging core to the miserable 2007/08 season? What a terrible let-down. Even with the lucky Rose break, the fact that none of the original Pax core (besides Deng) stuck around for the better Thibs seasons... isn't that essentially a failure? These guys were young too.

this has been discussed ad nauseum, but the "lucky rose break" actually COST the team wins in the long run. derrick ended up getting a boatload of money for 2 terrific regular seasons, basically

Pax was a failure as a GM

then so are most GMs. if you want to say that most GMs are "so bad" at their jobs, that's your prerogative

Well, if there were 15 good/successful GMs vs. 15 bad/unsuccessful in the 03-08 stretch, I lump Paxson at the top of the latter. Empirically speaking his overall record was basically that of a fringe 8-seed in the East during a time where the West was better. So right at the cusp of successful; I can see the argument that he was OK. Personally I lean he was slightly below-average, especially his roster's development was basically an M-shaped down-UP-down-up-DOWN graph. Started bad with a lot of young talent, ended bad with questionable young talent.

[dice]

I mean... a 4-year build-up with the young emerging core to the miserable 2007/08 season? What a terrible let-down. Even with the lucky Rose break, the fact that none of the original Pax core (besides Deng) stuck around for the better Thibs seasons... isn't that essentially a failure? These guys were young too.

this has been discussed ad nauseum, but the "lucky rose break" actually COST the team wins in the long run. derrick ended up getting a boatload of money for 2 terrific regular seasons, basically

Pax was a failure as a GM

then so are most GMs. if you want to say that most GMs are "so bad" at their jobs, that's your prerogative

Well, if there were 15 good/successful GMs vs. 15 bad/unsuccessful in the 03-08 stretch, I lump Paxson at the top of the latter. Empirically speaking his overall record was basically that of a fringe 8-seed in the East during a time where the West was better. So right at the cusp of successful; I can see the argument that he was OK. Personally I lean he was slightly below-average, especially his roster's development was basically an M-shaped down-UP-down-up-DOWN graph. Started bad with a lot of young talent, ended bad with questionable young talent.

if you think that paxson did a below average job building the team he inherited into a playoff team, your standards are off-the-charts. i mean, his record was virtually spotless. all major moves

-hits on hinrich
-hits on gordon
-trades following year's 1st rounder, which was #21, for #7 pick luol deng. absolute steal
-signs undrafted free agent nocioni
-traded curry for what became tyrus and joakim (most of us wanted spencer hawes for that elusive post scoring) ("but, but...it should have been LMA and joakim" )
-chose ben wallace over tyson chandler
-derrick rose
-traded 2 second rounders for asik

and he was BELOW AVERAGE during that stretch? seriously? then in early '09 he traded third year thabo for taj (everyone here, myself included, wanted dejuan blair) and stepped down as titular GM. by any reasonable standard, paxson was freaking FANTASTIC before gar reared his head

[BullsFTW]

It’s too bad that AK was not around when Jimmy Butler, Derrick Rose, Joakim Noah, and Luol Deng were with the Bulls...Things would’ve been different.

you realize that those guys were all here in the first place because of pax, right?

I know that. I’ve always liked Paxson, but Gar on other hand...

[RedBulls23]

Lmao Gar/Pax said "nah" to actually trying to build a team around this guy.

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[Darius Miles Davis]

Tonight was Jimmy Butler's finest hour. What a game.

[PaKii94]

Lmao Gar/Pax said "nah" to actually trying to build a team around this guy.

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[TheGOATRises007]

He just outplayed Lebron James in an NBA finals game down 2-0.

What a player.

[TheSuzerain]

He just outplayed Lebron James in an NBA finals game down 2-0.

What a player.

This doesn't even come close to describing how well he just played which is pretty crazy.

By the numbers, he just put in a top 5 finals game of all time. Which is a preposterous statement, but an uber efficient 40 point triple-double is some rare air. That was nuts.

[Ice Man]

By the numbers, he just put in a top 5 finals game of all time. Which is a preposterous statement, but an uber efficient 40 point triple-double is some rare air. That was nuts.

As I wrote in another thread, per John Hollinger's Game Score this was the second best performance in a Finals game since 1984, narrowly behind one of LBJ's games against the Warriors.

[TheGOATRises007]

He just outplayed Lebron James in an NBA finals game down 2-0.

What a player.

This doesn't even come close to describing how well he just played which is pretty crazy.

By the numbers, he just put in a top 5 finals game of all time. Which is a preposterous statement, but an uber efficient 40 point triple-double is some rare air. That was nuts.

It is probably the best finals game anyone not named Shaq/Lebron/Jordan ever played in the history of the NBA.

He was unreal.

[nomorezorro]

we put dwyane wade and rajon rondo next to him and traded him away. lol

[RedBulls23]

Lol Embiid

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[Southpaw]

Good enough to be the best player in a game with Lebron and AD. What a game from Jimmy!