Will he play? Or will be be traded before tipoff? And if Jimmy Butler does play for the Minnesota Timberwolves tonight in San Antonio, what will it mean for his team and for the rest of the NBA?
The guy everyone has been watching during the Preseason of Butler is scheduled to be wearing a Minnesota uniform tonight for the first meaningful time since the Wolves were eliminated from the postseason in the spring … a loss after which Butler flew to Los Angeles by himself rather than return with his teammates to Minneapolis.
What are the odds something interesting happens tonight? That is a lock “yes” for which no one will post a line.
But what will happen if/when Butler is on the court? We’ve got you covered on that one.
The folks at BetDSI have posted odds on Butler’s points (over/under is 21.5), assists (4.5) and rebounds (5.5) for the season opener that is available to anyone on NBA League Pass, and the only regret from this writer is that there is no line on how many times he will yell over to Gregg Popovich: “Trade for me!”
Pretty much nobody believes that Butler will be in a Minnesota uniform past the February trade deadline, but the entire NBA is playing a waiting game with the Wolves’ front office to see just how unbearable Jimmy Buckets might become.
At a certain point, the Wolves could reach a point where they are forced to take whatever is the best offer on the table, because confrontations among teammates can escalate (see Arenas, Gilbert; and “Pick One.”)
For what it is worth, Butler is still on the board in the MVP futures market at 110-1, and the true believers who subsist on Wild Rice soup can get the Wolves to win the NBA championship at 160-1.
Also, Butler is 100-1 to win MVP — the same odds as John Wall, Bradley Beal and Blake Griffin.
Watching especially closely tonight (among others) will be the Miami Heat, Los Angeles Clippers and Houston Rockets — all of whom have tried to acquire Butler over the course of the preseason only to run into the brick wall known as Scott Layden, the Timberwolves’ GM.
Layden is notorious for trying to pry a little something extra from an opposing GM, and he has worked for every type of owner imaginable — from Larry Miller in Utah to James Dolan in New York to Glen Taylor in Minneapolis. They only things all three men have in common is this: They are moody (raise your hand if you are unlike them, and them please spread your secret to the rest of us).
This has led to faulty reporting, viral tweets, disingenuous denials (that would be you, Pat Riley) and a furthering of the rumor mill/aggregation journalism dysfunction that is killing off the people who try to do things the right way.
Of course, Butler could have done things the right way and simply honored his contract, listened to his coach and made peace with his younger teammates, but NBA players roll in a different world than normal folk.
And when emotions get involved and the ability to reason is compromised, you end up with people keeping their eyes glued on their Twitter and Instagram feeds rather than on the basketball games being shown on TV or played right in front of them at NBA arenas.
Whatever the case, this is the world we live in as Night 2 of the 2018-19 NBA season gets underway with a mammoth slate, and wagering lines, alternate lines and prop bets on a game-to-game basis are placed on the board.
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