Jimmy Butler went to Timberwolves practice on Wednesday, marking the first time he’s joined the full team for a team-sponsored basketball activity since his trade request three weeks ago.
On the surface, that seems like a positive for Tom Thibodeau, as he has been constantly trying to get Butler to join the team and try to work things out. But as more and more reports came out, we found out this was actually a disaster. Butler apparently went after Thibs, GM Scott Layden, Karl-Anthony Towns, and Andrew Wiggins in the practice, at one point telling Layden, “you f*cking need me.”
There have been other reports that somehow paint an even worse picture than what ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski reported, with Butler going after Towns and Wiggins — long the targets of his frustration in Minnesota — during practice. ESPN’s Amin Elhassan went on The Jump and said he heard Butler took the third stringers for the Timberwolves and beat the starters in a scrimmage.
https://twitter.com/MarvB_/status/1050105510727471109
https://twitter.com/TheRenderNBA/status/1050107313879691264
At this point, I’ll believe just about anything with this situation and knowing what we know about Butler and his competitive nature, it wouldn’t surprise me if he was out there taking Josh Okogie, Gorgui Dieng, and the rest and giving Towns, Wiggins, and company the blues. Woj later confirmed this in just an amazing tweet that claimed Butler’s teammates were “mesmerized” by a “tour de force” performance.
A lot of Minnesota players left Timberwolves practice today energized by Butler's performance, mesmerized with him taking end-of-the-bench players and running the table on the regulars, sources said. At the end, he marched out like if a mic drop. Butler delivered a tour de force.
— Adrian Wojnarowski (@wojespn) October 10, 2018
The thing about all this is the Wolves and Thibodeau specifically invited this onto themselves. Butler’s been saying for weeks he doesn’t want to be there and to get a deal done, and now he’s going to force the issue by making sure your practices go terribly and everyone’s miserable so long that he’s there.
