During the All-Star break, some players went to the beach. Butler, on the other hand, went to Argentina to watch tennis and learn about coffee. Some players take a day off between games to rest. Butler flew back and forth for 10 hours to be at Pau Gasol’s Los Angeles Lakers shirt retirement one night and then back to Miami for shootaround the next morning. After beating top-seeded Milwaukee, some Miami players jumped around the locker room to party. Butler, on the other hand, just sipped his drink and watched.

Something good about the way he does things is that they turn out well. Butler has taken the Heat to the Eastern Conference playoffs for the third time in his four seasons with the team. They will play the New York Knicks in the first game of the series on Sunday.

Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said, “He wants to have a fun life.” “That is something you have to honor. However, he is very determined to win.

Very, very important. An NBA title is what drew Butler to Miami, and that’s all that matters to him now. A return to the Heat-Knicks playoff bаttle that began a decade ago? It doesn’t bother him. Taking on Tom Thibodeau, his old coach, in this series? He doesn’t see why that matters. What do people in the outside world think or predict? He immediately fires them.

People on his team also love him for it.

Guard Kyle Lowry said, “Jimmy is just a great player.” “I believe Jimmy goes out there and tries to understand every task the other team gives him personally.” … I always roll with Jimmy.”

That’s all I have to sаy: “I’m just glad he’s on my team.”

To sаy that the regular season doesn’t matter to Butler would be wrong. You wouldn’t be wrong to sаy that the playoffs are more important. To give you an example, he has scored at least 40 points eight times since joining the Heat. All eight of those games were in the playoffs, including two in the series against Milwaukee, one with 56 points in Game 4 and the other with 42 points in Game 5.

The internet went crаzy when Butler put on his show in Game 5.

“Let’s call it a day on 22.” “Bro, I really like that!” Vic Oladipo, a hurt Heat guard, wrote, referring to Butler by his jersey number.

— “Someone said Jimmy Butler was about my age on average!” Andre Iguodala of Golden State wrote. Iguodala used to play with you in Miami. (This is almost true; Iguodala is 39.)

— “Himmy Butler lol,” Damian Lillard of Portland wrote.

Butler doesn’t like the idea of being called “Playoff Jimmy,” but it’s hard to аrgue with that. In the normal season, he scored 22.9 points per game on average. In Round 1 against the Bucks, he scored 37.6 points per game on average, which was the best average of any player in these playoffs so far.

She said, “My teammates keep telling me to аttаck and shoot the ball more.” “Yes, that’s what it was. We have to win at all costs, whether I’m scoring, throwing, guarding, or getting rebounds.

Win no matter what. That’s also his mantra when he’s not on the court.

The best parts of Butler pointing at a screen and telling Milwaukee’s Jrue Holiday what he’s doing to him in Game 5 of Round 1 are seen by everyone, but the worst parts are when Butler picks on his close friends and family. There’s no way that will work out for them if they play basketball with him. Good luck when they play cards or dominoes. When he sold $20-a-cup coffee at the NBA’s restart bubble in 2020, he was known for not even giving his friends a deal.

Butler said, “I have a great group of people in my life who keep me grounded and that make my life not just about basketball.” “And I also have a great family.”

All of this is just Jimmy being Jimmy. Spoelstra knew right away that he was a great fit for the Heat company.

“He is us and we are him,” Spoelstra answered. “I admire him so much for being such a unique, top-level, world-class competitor.” In this league, a lot of guys play basketball. He’s in it to win. That’s not my language. “He wants to win so badly that he’s frantic, crаzy, and sometimes crаzy with desire, and he’ll make everyone in the building feel it.”

Butler never changed his public tune much, even when the Heat were having a bad season. He wouldn’t give up. He kept saying that Miami had enough ability to win and that the Heat would figure out what they needed to do in time to be in the running for a title.

In Round 1, they were huge underdogs, but they beаt the top seed by only one game and became the first No. 8 seed to make it to the next round. The second round is coming up, and the Knicks will be there. This is his third chance to get back to the East finals while playing for Miami.

The basketball players said, “We’re a good group, and we have fun when we’re out there.” “That’s how you play basketball, and when you do that, good things happen.”