Jimmy Butler Comes Clean After Battling Mavericks’ Defense

It was a frustrating Thursday night for the Miami Heat and specifically for star Jimmy Butler as he had a down performance which led to the defeat against the Dallas Mavericks, 114-108. Butler spoke after the game to talk about the Mavericks’ plan to double team and apply pressure as expressed that it looked like the opponents were sending “triple teams” according to Ira Winderman of The Sun Sentinel.

“Double teams?” he said. “Those were triple teams.”

For Butler, he scored 14 points, the lowest he’s scored in a full contest since the seven-game losing skid, to go along with recording five assists and collecting four rebounds. The star would acknowledge that opposing squads sending double teams are “expected,” but mentioned how he needed to “pick my spots better” and to limit the turnovers as he had six facing Dallas.

“I mean, it’s expected, honestly,” Butler said of the double teams. “I think I just got to pick my spots better, not turn the ball over as much, and honestly just continue to play basketball the right way — put all the trust that I always do into my guys, and we’re going to live with the result of them taking and making all the wide-open shots that they’re going to continue to get when teams double.”

Erik Spoelstra talks about the effectiveness of double teams on Butler

Heat head coach Erik Spoelstra commented on the Mavericks strategy in defending Butler, saying it “definitely had an impact” on the loss Thursday night. What Dallas succeeded in doing was taking the 34-year old out of his “sweet spots” as Spoelstra called it, but he also saw it as a learning experience to know how to counter it.

“That definitely had an impact,” Spoelstra said of the double teams per Winderman. “They were pretty committed to getting the ball out of his hands and getting him out of his sweet spots from there.

“It’s good that we see a lot of these things because we have to find different ways then to make sure he gets activated and other ways that he can get to his strength zones,” Spoelstra continued. “He’s fully capable of that. I also need to do a better job getting him top of the floor and into some other areas, where it’s not as easy to corral him.”

While Butler was cold, one of the few bright spots for the Heat was Duncan Robinson who scored 19 points as he made seven of his 10 shots from the field. Even better, he was five of eight from three-point range where he made his first five attempts as he spoke after the loss about the team finding ways to help Butler get into rhythm.

“Definitely, as a team, just continue to find him in spots where he can be successful,” Robinson said. “If you’re going to double team, find opportunities for him kind of in those in-between areas. Transition, just giving him the ball when he has a mismatch, so he can go right away. We got to do a better job of just getting him the ball.”

Looking at the game as a whole, the Heat led for most of this game until the second half where Mavericks stars Luka Doncic, Kyrie Irving, and the rest of the team found a groove and took control. Doncic recorded a triple-double as he scored 35 points, recorded 11 rebounds, and 11 assists whereas Irving scored 23.

Spoelstra spoke about the Heat’s overall performance to the media and mentioned how they could have made it “a little bit tougher on them to protect the paint” in reference to the Mavericks. However, he understood that Miami had some great looks from deep which they made 17 out of 38 attempts.

“There are some things that we could have done to make it a little bit tougher on them to protect the paint,” Spoelstra said. “A lot of that is on me. But some of the 3-point looks we had were very good. You have to take what’s available and what that possession presents, whatever the open shot may be.”

Butler crediting Dallas for giving them a taste of their own medicine

If there was a comparison to how the Mavericks played the Heat, they beat them using their own medicine according to Butler. He would say that he played rough, tough, and out of then mud, which is “always what we’re supposed to hang our hat on.”

“They made shots, got to the loose balls,” Butler said via The Sun Sentinel. “That’s always what we’re supposed to hang our hat on. They got way too many offensive rebounds. We didn’t really dive on the floor like we always say what we’re going to do. I guess it’s kind of like the karma of the game a little bit.”

Butler injury something to monitor?

Part of the down performance could have also been that Butler suffered what looked like to be a wrist injury right before the end of the first half. On a shot attempt from Butler where a Dallas defender tried to block it, his wrist got jammed in the process which the star was holding on to for a long period of time.

While there were questions about his availability, he would start the second half and play the rest of the game. Whether that had an effect on his performance is up in the air, but Butler said he is “aright” and emphasized at this point of the season, “we got to play through it right now more than ever.”

“I’ll be alright,” Butler said. “Just some hand stuff. It’s part of the game and we got to play through it right now more than ever.”

Butler is averaging 21.7 points, 5.5 rebounds, and 4.8 assists per game while shooting 50.6 percent from the field.

After the loss, the Heat drop to a 35-27 record which puts them sixth in a tightly packed Eastern Conference as there is very little room for error. They will not get much rest as their next contest is Friday night against the Oklahoma City Thunder on the tail-end of a back to back.