Shot on location at ZZ’s Membership, Miami
Jimmy Butler is in all places lately.
There he’s on the US Open, serving as an honorary ball boy for an exhibition match between Carlos Alcaraz and Frances Tiafoe. There he’s within the new music video for Fall Out Boy’s “So A lot (For) Stardust,” sporting his now-legendary “Emo Jimmy” look. There he’s in adverts for Hulu, Alo, State Farm and Inns.com. There he’s sampling merchandise for BIGFACE, his budding espresso model, and on the first-ever Reserve Cup, a padel competitors that he helped convey to Miami. There he’s on the Kaseya Middle, hovering for lobs and flattening threes.
And right here he’s at ZZ’s Membership Miami, singing and dancing alongside to Lloyd’s “You,” respiration power into the membership’s swanky sports activities bar. He’s, in spite of everything, 5 cups of espresso in, and it’s simply 2:30 p.m. (he drinks 10-12 cups a day, by the way in which). A large-ranging playlist booms by way of a handheld speaker—all the pieces from “Let Me Love You” by Mario to “Jamming” by Bob Marley & the Wailers to “Loop Gap” by Tee Grizzley that includes 21 Savage. In between posing for pictures, the Warmth star snacks on sushi and sips an quaint.
Welcome to Jimmy Butler’s SLAM cowl shoot, and welcome, extra broadly, to his ever-growing universe, the place you’re invited—err, inspired—to be your genuine self always. To comply with no matter passions you could have.
SLAM 249 that includes Jimmy Butler is on the market now. Store right here.
Butler is a person of many pursuits: espresso, wine, nation music, tennis, padel, soccer (which he calls soccer), dominoes, spades, UNO, touring—the listing goes on. He’s at all times as much as one thing, at all times surrounded by household and buddies. His home in Miami doesn’t even have TVs. As a substitute of binge-watching reveals, Butler does issues like chase tennis balls round Louis Armstrong Stadium in Queens, NY, as a result of, nicely, it’s enjoyable and he felt like doing it. He’s at the moment engaged on his personal nation album; proper now, it options 62 songs (!) and Butler, who has performed a DJ Khaled-like position, is debating whether or not to hop on one.
“He likes to get into an entire bunch of stuff that you simply wouldn’t assume he would take pleasure in doing,” says Butler’s teammate Caleb Martin. “He’s simply tremendous lively, man, whether or not he’s doing one thing on an off day or assembly up with sure kinds of artists or taking part in dominoes or going to tennis matches. He’s undoubtedly a dude stuffed with surprises.”
Surprises like…starring in that aforementioned Fall Out Boy video in an all-purple cowboy outfit.
“Something to shake up something on the web and regularly be myself, be pleased and love my life and what I’m doing, I’m down,” Butler says. The video was shot over All-Star break and it dropped lower than two weeks later. And sure, it shook up the web.
Butler strikes a troublesome stability: he doesn’t take life too severely, however he’s additionally extraordinarily aggressive. He cracks jokes, however usually leaves individuals questioning…was that basically a joke?
“Don’t be fooled since you see me on TV or a industrial or a billboard, I do plenty of the identical stuff y’all do,” he says, earlier than including with a smile, “I’m in all probability simply higher at it than all y’all…however I can’t assist that.”
The reality (and irony) is, Butler engages in lots of extracurricular actions, reminiscent of tennis and songwriting, “to humble” himself. He needs to expertise firsthand the challenges of different professions. After all, he’s additionally sure that if he retains working at one thing, he’ll excel at it. He has a burning need to be the very best at all the pieces he does.
To win at all the pieces he does.
Take spades, for instance. The Warmth wish to play on the workforce aircraft throughout lengthy highway journeys. “After I say he doesn’t lose, he doesn’t lose,” ahead Jamal Cain says. “Me and Haywood Highsmith beat him as soon as and he was form of shitty after that. I form of noticed it in his face. He’s very aggressive. He doesn’t wish to lose.”
Or take dominoes, which is likely to be the sport Jimmy is finest at (together with the one he’s well-known for). “He’s a top-five, top-10 dominoes participant on the planet,” claims Chris Brickley, Butler’s coach. “I do know this as a result of he and [Colombian singer] J Balvin have flown within the prime dominoes gamers on the planet, like, world champions. And he’s beat them.”
“That’s some Jimmy shit,” Martin remarks with fun. He and his twin brother, Cody, are a uncommon duo which have truly beat Jimmy in dominoes. “And we ain’t performed since,” Martin says. “On and off the court docket, he doesn’t wish to lose. He’s ducking me, for certain. Ever since we performed him, he tells me and my brother, ‘Y’all are The Funky Brothers.’ Me and Cody play funky, so it messes him up.”
Butler brings that very same aggressive mindset to his model, BIGFACE, which he’s very devoted to constructing. Together with the BIGFACE workforce, he has visited Colombia and Ecuador on a quest to search out the very best espresso. He’s even attempting to grasp latte artwork and methods to make the proper cappuccino.
“Folks can see this on the court docket as nicely—his dedication to one thing and to figuring out all the pieces there may be to find out about it interprets from basketball to espresso,” says Britt Berg, Chief Working Officer at BIGFACE. She and Butler textual content about espresso nearly daily.
BIGFACE is ready to open its first brick-and-mortar store in Miami later this yr, a milestone that Jimmy is eagerly awaiting. “After I’m not training, once I’m not with my children, once I’m not in a sport, I can inform you the place I’m gonna be, and that’s on this espresso store, assembly all of the followers of myself and of espresso,” he says. “As a result of I do love espresso, I do wish to convey the very best espresso to Miami. I don’t assume there’s a spot like that right here but, and I would like the primary BIGFACE café to be that, in order that’s the place I’m gonna be. And we’d like that. Miami wants that…together with a championship!”
Ah, sure. We should always in all probability speak a bit about basketball. It’s mid-March after we shoot this cowl—or, as Butler calls it, “that point.”
Enable him to elaborate: “It’s the time the place individuals actually gotta take into consideration going up towards the Miami Warmth and myself. I do know what I’m able to. I do know what my squad is able to. And don’t no person wish to see us in a seven-game sequence in any case. We all know that.”
We do.
Miami completed eighth within the Japanese Convention with a 46-36 file. However, then once more, the Warmth entered final yr’s playoffs because the No. 8 seed earlier than occurring an epic run to the Finals. In 2019-20, the League’s bubble season, Miami reached the Finals because the No. 5 seed.
“No one can inform you something proper now,” Jimmy says. “There are three issues that you simply gotta have as a way to win a championship: you’ve gotta be taking part in your finest basketball on the proper time, you gotta be wholesome, and also you gotta be fortunate. That’s simply the way in which that it’s. So can’t no person inform proper now who’s going to have all three of these issues.”
Butler quietly had one other stellar yr, posting 20.8 factors, 5.3 rebounds and 5.0 assists per sport and taking pictures a career-high 41.4 p.c from behind the arc. Don’t count on him to be launching extra threes within the postseason, although. “I simply don’t like taking pictures threes as a result of I wish to run into you,” he says. “I wish to hit anyone. You’ll be able to’t hit no person when you shoot threes. I wish to see who’s going to give up first. I’m gonna maintain working in there, I’m gonna hit you, and I’m gonna hit you once more, and I’m gonna hit you once more, and we’re gonna see who’s gonna give up.”
That seems like one thing the fabled and fearless “Playoff Jimmy” would say, doesn’t it? Solely factor is, Butler continues to disclaim that Playoff Jimmy exists.
“That’s not a factor for the hundredth time,” he insists. “Playoff Jimmy will not be a factor. Emo Jimmy, factor. Soccer Jimmy, factor. Tennis Jimmy, factor. Daddy Jimmy, factor. Zaddy Jimmy, factor. However Playoff Jimmy, not a lot.”
OK, honest sufficient. However value noting: over a four-season stretch, Butler has led Miami to the Japanese Convention Finals thrice and to the Finals twice, averaging 24.7 factors, 6.8 rebounds, 5.7 assists and 1.9 steals by way of 64 playoff video games. Throughout the 2020 Finals, he registered two triple-doubles, together with simply the third 40-point triple-double in Finals historical past. In Sport 6 of the 2022 ECF, he hung 47 factors, 9 rebounds, 8 assists and 4 steals on the Celtics to pressure a Sport 7 (considered one of 4 40-plus-point performances he had that postseason). He set a franchise playoff file with 56 factors in Sport 4 of final season’s first-round sequence towards the top-seeded Bucks, then adopted it up with 42 factors in Sport 5 as his workforce pulled off one of many largest upsets ever.
Butler will admit that issues “ramp up a notch” this time of yr. Amid the previous couple of weeks of the common season and into the playoffs, he and Brickley begin figuring out the evening earlier than each single sport. They examine the protection Miami is about to face and attempt to replicate the precise conditions Butler will discover himself in. What spots on the ground will likely be open? What pictures will likely be out there? What switches would possibly happen? Butler’s basketball IQ is “in all probability the very best IQ out of any participant I’ve labored with,” says Brickley.
Martin, who has been with the Warmth since 2021, notices a “psychological shift” in Jimmy because the playoffs loom. “I believe him having the expertise of going by way of this section so many occasions, he is aware of methods to time stuff up together with his physique, after which [there’s] the psychological a part of it, too, him simply being so regular mentally,” Martin explains. “He’s very strategic. He is aware of when it’s time to ramp up. He is aware of what video games in all probability harm greater than others or regardless of the case is. Every little thing he does, he thinks about.”
The added reps within the fitness center assist, as does Butler’s very calculated strategy. But when there’s one purpose to imagine Playoff Jimmy is actual, and that different groups ought to worry his impending arrival, it’s this: Jimmy Butler is absolutely assured in who he’s and what he’s able to. There’s a consolation in that, a peace. Any emotions of self-doubt and stress are gone. He doesn’t care one bit what others take into consideration him—what others predict he and his workforce will or received’t do.
That kind of confidence has a approach of rubbing off on the individuals round him: buddies, colleagues, teammates.
“When you’ve got a pacesetter like that, it provides you a way of confidence in your talents and what you’re doing,” says Berg.
“The very first thing I seen with Jimmy, he’s very comfy being in his pores and skin. He doesn’t care what anybody thinks about him,” Cain provides. “Seeing how he carried himself and the way assured and cozy he was in his pores and skin solely made me extra comfy being who I’m.”
Cain remembers one sport day when he and different members of the Warmth huddled as much as pray earlier than taking the court docket, as was their ritual, and requested that Jimmy flip down the music he was blasting. “Y’all should be praying to me!” Butler responded. “He stated it in a joking method, however simply the truth that that was the very first thing on his thoughts, I used to be like, Wow, that is Jimmy in a nutshell,” Cain recollects with a chuckle.
It’s no coincidence that Butler describes the Warmth as being “overly assured in a great way.” Largely, that id stems from him. Regardless of the ups and downs of the common season, Butler has little doubt that his workforce has what it takes to make one other deep playoff run.
Why?
“We simply have a special approach of going about issues,” he says. “Our teaching workers cares and so they’re continually finding out how we will make all people on our roster keep on with their robust fits and avoid the weak factors of their video games. Possession cares—they’re at each observe, they’re on the aircraft. We’re speaking to 1 one other. We actually fuck with each other, which is an efficient factor. And, um…”
He pauses for a second and flashes a sly smile.
“I’m on the workforce. So, I’m taking my probabilities each time.”
Portraits by Alex Subers
