Jimmy Butler is on the trade market, as the All-Star wing has reportedly submitted a trade request to to Minnesota Timberwolves. However, there are a pair of things complicating matters: One is that Butler has given the team a trio of places he’d prefer to be traded, with one report going as far as to say he’s determined to end up in Los Angeles on the Clippers.
Beyond that, any team that trades for Butler will have to have faith that they can convince him to sign a contract extension this upcoming summer. Like Kawhi Leonard, Butler has the ability to hit the open market once July 1, 2019 rolls around, so if a team wants to acquire him, it needs to spend the next year doing everything in its power to convince him to stick around.
Players of Butler’s caliber don’t become available all the time, though, which leads us to a report by Jon Krawczynski of The Athletic. According to Krawczynski, not all of the NBA teams that are interested in bringing Butler on board need a guarantee that he’ll stick around long-term.
https://twitter.com/JonKrawczynski/status/1042877979196645382
This could be read in a few ways. Perhaps a team is happy to take Butler on as a rental because they believe they’re a title contender with him, and are willing to go for broke and let him walk when the summer rolls around. Or maybe a team views this the same way Toronto viewed acquiring Leonard: They have an entire NBA season to convince Butler that, on and off the court, their franchise is the one for him — something OKC succeeded in doing with Paul George.
If anything, this is good news for Minnesota, as it shows there’s a market for Butler despite the rumblings about wanting to end up in Brooklyn, Los Angeles, or New York. Whether it means one of the other 26 NBA teams pulls off a deal for him, though, still remains to be seen.
