Dwyane Wade rips Jimmy Butler’s playoffs on Warriors: ‘He wouldn’t look at the basket…I’ve seen it in a Heat jersey’

Miami Heat legend Dwyane Wade recently took some time to break down the Golden State Warriors’ second-round playoff series against the Minnesota Timberwolves.

The Warriors, missing star guard Stephen Curry for almost all of the series, ended up falling to the Wolves in five games despite taking a 1-0 series lead. Golden State newcomer Jimmy Butler had his moments in the series, but he also lacked aggression at times with Curry sidelined, including in the final two games.

Wade, in a podcast episode that was seemingly recorded after the Warriors lost Game 4 but before they were eliminated in Game 5, appeared critical of Butler’s Game 4 performance, and he compared it to Butler’s play in the 2023 NBA Finals.

“I didn’t like…the way he just approached the game,” Wade said, seemingly in reference to Game 4 of the series. “I know Jimmy is a pass-first guy. I know he’s about getting his teammates the ball and wanting to see them shine. But it’s a point where…this ain’t working. You gotta go. He wouldn’t look at the basket, and I’ve seen this before. I’ve seen it in a Heat jersey. And so, in a sense, when Pat [Riley] come out, Pat say, ‘We ain’t wanna give you the extension,’ it’s not always because of injuries. Sometimes it’s, ‘I need to see what you gonna do in every moment, not just in one moment.’

“We saw Jimmy in the bubble. He was a dog. I saw Jimmy in another Finals too against the Denver Nuggets, and he did the exact same thing he did the other night. He did not look at the basket. I don’t wanna see that. Jimmy Butler is too good of a basketball player to not have his imprint on the game, and sorry, sir, when it’s time for you to take over, you just have to. And even if you can’t do it from a standpoint of you ain’t making no shots, I don’t care. Shoot. It’s bad offense if you’re not shooting. To get too close in that paint and not putting that ball up to that basket, that’s bad offense when your team needs you to do it.”

The Warriors entered Game 4 of the series in a 1-2 hole, and they desperately needed to win the game (which was at home) in order to get themselves back in the fight.

Unfortunately for Golden State, a victory wasn’t in the cards, as Minnesota used a dominant third quarter to take a 3-1 series lead. Butler wasn’t very aggressive at all in the loss, as he took just nine shots and finished with 14 points.

Later, in Game 5, Butler ended up having another underwhelming scoring performance as the Warriors were eliminated. He took just 11 shots and finished with 17 points.

Earlier in the series, Butler reminded everyone that he’s capable of flipping his playoff switch, as he had 33 points in Game 3. But in the other games of the series, he wasn’t as much of a scoring threat.

In the 2023 NBA Playoffs with the Heat, Butler miraculously helped Miami reach the NBA Finals as the No. 8 seed in the Eastern Conference. He was particularly dominant in the opening round of those playoffs, and in the first three rounds combined, he averaged 28.5 points per game on 20.6 shots per contest.

In the NBA Finals against the Nuggets, however, he was a bit less aggressive, as he averaged 21.6 points per game on 18.4 shots per contest. It’s worth noting that he might’ve been hampered by an ankle injury at times in those playoffs that he suffered in the second round.

Butler has earned a reputation as an elite playoff performer, and part of that stems from his play in the bubble, when he led the Heat to a different NBA Finals appearance. But he may also have a tendency to be too passive at times, and that’s likely something that he will need to fix in order to satisfy Wade.