"Sixth Place Showdowns"! That's hard to swallow after the Champions League today. I can't believe Jimmy said that. It is so embarrassing. Your goal at the beginning of the season, and half-way through, is to finish SIXTH?
Dave Hyde is the dean of Greater Miami sports columnists. This was penned EIGHT days ago. His most recent, titled “Miami Heat have had good 5-year era. Is it ending?” is behind a pay wall.
April 1 (Since then we’ve gone 2-2):
Let’s not mince words: It’s time for Jimmy Butler to show up. As in play each Miami Heat game. As in care when he does play.
…
That’s assuming he still can take over games [The Big O says he can’t.], night after night, at age 34. The numbers say he can. His chosen nights to shine do, too. But that’s part of the intrigue here. When does meandering through a season stop being a choice and become a way of life?
The NBA playoffs haven’t begun, but this stretch in front of the Heat will go a good way in deciding their playoff fate. These final games are scary. Tightwire-walk scary. There are eight games left against many of the teams they’re battling for playoffs spots starting with home games against the New York Knicks on Tuesday [W] and Philadelphia on Thursday [L].
The Heat are a half-game off the sixth [Today we're 1.5 games off and heading barring miracles into the play-in] playoff spot and a first-round matchup with beatable Cleveland. They’re also staring at the abyss of anything below sixth place that involves the dreaded play-in game and series against heavyweights Boston or Milwaukee.
Let’s dismiss the idea they went from the play-in games to the NBA Finals last year, so what’s the big deal? The Baltimore Ravens also won a Super Bowl with quarterback Trent Dilfer. That doesn’t mean that’s the blueprint to winning.
[YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Barry Jackson, take NOTE!]
The Heat need Butler to be The Man again. Or at least A Man on the team, especially with Tyler Herro still out. It can be tough to watch Butler wander through winter if you’re wrapped up in the regular season. Maybe if you’re Bam Adebayo, too, giving your all, making each night matter, being the very definition of the worker-bee “Heat Culture” concept the franchise turned into a marketing tool.
[I think Hyde is telling what he's not telling there.]
A week ago Butler went to The Miami [Tennis] Open for eight hours and didn’t play the next night. The official ruling: He was sick. …
[He looks fine! Locked in. In fairness that was DURING his eight hours there, not AFTER. Hard to tell looking at a person that he’s sick…I think. Big O: “Heat” fans may turn on Jimmy next season.]
There’s plenty in Butler’s season to think he’s playing a purposeful possum again this regular season. …
The defining stat to Butler’s regular season hasn’t changed in his five Heat seasons.
[I hear the voice of 601 Biscayne in this column, in Hyde's latest (which I can't read yet) and the Big O's recent tweets, viz: This "good 5-year era" will not be extended; Jimmy will not be extended. Hyde's colleague Ira Winderman wrote months ago that Jimmy is looking to become the HIGHEST PAID PLAYER IN THE GAME! T'ain't happenin'.]
…Butler has played 52 of the Heat’s 74 games thus far. If he plays all eight to the finish, that’s 60 games. That’s right in line with the 58, 52, 57 and 64 games his previous Heat seasons. It’s easy to get caught up in that as the season plays out, especially if you’re bought a ticket.
[The Big H? This is reading very much like the Big O’s recent tweet.]
Once upon a time, NBA stars showed up every night. It came with the idea of a star. Michael Jordan played at least 78 games in 12 of his 14 seasons (not counting his return from baseball in mid-1994-95). He played all 82 games in his last season at age 40 in 2002-03.
“It mattered to me,’’ he said.
[Owie. Bald truth: the regular season has not mattered to Jimmy.]
Somewhere in the past two decades it quit mattering. You can pinpoint the start of it. It was Friday, November 30, 2012. San Antonio coach Greg Popovich didn’t even have his starters fly to Miami for nationally televised game the night after a Spurs game in Orlando. He rested them. Ticket-buying fans were irate. TNT was irate.
“This is an unacceptable decision by the Spurs and substantial sanctions will be forthcoming,’’ NBA Commissioner David Stern said.
[I thought it was a Christmas Day game and both teams sat out stars. I guess I was wrong. Stern was absolutely FURIOUS.]
…
Butler has played 21, 4, 17 and 22 playoff games the past four years, too. Look at his production, too. He averaged 21 points last regular-season and 26.9 in the playoffs when the Heat made the NBA Finals. They’ve made the Finals in two of the past four years, and the Eastern Conference Finals another season.
…That’s why the Playoff Jimmy name sticks. It’s why this career game plan of sitting out games or meandering in others he does play hasn’t been much of an issue.
But it’s time, isn’t it?
[Yeah. PAST time.]
“What matters is getting sixth,’’ Butler said several weeks ago when the Heat hit a down period.
I'm reading it and still can't believe it. It is so unprofessional, so cynical. Especially today. You notice I'm not blogging the NBA games that have started? I've lost some interest in the "Heat", because they've lost some interest in playing. I feel like a chump breathlessly following "Sixth Place Showdowns".
