The Miami Heat got a guy in their own mold, nabbing Jimmy Butler this past summer. A star in the NBA, he’s still the most underrated guy in the league.
The Miami Heat are the definition of being underrated, counted out, and overachieving. If you take a look at them, it sticks out like a sore thumb.
Erik Spoelstra wasn’t supposed to be there as the head coach. He was just the lowly video coordinator, who before working his way up to the top of the coaching ranks, thought he may not even survive a transitioning regime.
Thank the hoops gods that he did though, he’s still there fighting to prove his greatness every day, two championships later. He isn’t the only one though.
The OG, Udonis Haslem, is another vivid example of this concept of being underrated. He wasn’t supposed to be where he is either, at least not doing what he does.
He would always end up in his hometown of Miami, Florida, it’s just what he’s made of, but to make it where he has professionally is a testament only to his hard work, determination, and fortitude. Fortunately for the Miami Heat moving forward though, these aren’t the only two big names on this list anymore.
"When he left the Bulls, they got worse. That's an absolute fact. When he left Minnesota, they got worse. When he left the Sixers, they got worse."@jalenrose explains why he considers Jimmy Butler to be the most underrated player in the NBA. pic.twitter.com/lAcTDoBPCR
— First Take (@FirstTake) May 11, 2020
Jimmy Butler is another one of these players for the Miami Heat that defines the word underrated. As Jalen Rose illustrates above, whenever Jimmy Buckets has left a team, they have become a worse team than they were when he was there. While that doesn’t scream underrated as much as unappreciated, they are one and the same when you think about how he is talked about in basketball circles.
Those are apart of our next reasons though. When people heard that Jimmy Butler was coming to the Miami Heat, they laughed it off as a joke of sorts.
We all know them by now, the greatest hits, from “he’s just going on vacation” to “an early paid retirement”. Not only did those takes disrespect the Miami Heat as an organization for what they have built and are trying to build, but it disrespects Jimmy for one of several reasons.
You either believe he can’t lead this Heat team to a title, that he doesn’t want to lead a team to a title, or both. All of those scream towards the underrated nature of Jimmy Butler’s basketball acumen.
Lastly, when thinking about this current iteration of the Miami Heat and the season they were having before the suspension was put into place, people still tried to discredit what they had accomplished.
While they had dropped a game or so that they should have won and hadn’t been quite as crisp as they were to start the season, what teams besides a few of the greatest we have ever seen assembled, haven’t had a few hiccups along the way? With Jimmy being the lead dog, dismissing the team’s chances means dismissing him and what he brings to the table.
On a slightly lesser level, you also have those murmurs that tend to hint at the notion that Jimmy Butler can’t lead a team to a title or be the best player on a championship team. Well, save for a three rim, insane, last-second shot from Kawhi Leonard last season, Jimmy Butler’s Philadelphia 76ers may have won that title instead of Toronto.
We’ll never know for certain, but if Toronto was able to do it and considering how Philly took them wire to wire very closely contested, they may have had just as good a chance to do it as well. Secondly and in case you weren’t aware, Jimmy Butler was absolutely the best player on that Philadelphia team as well.
We value and appreciate Jimmy because he drips and oozes of Miami Heat Culture. He is underrated by everyone else though, but we don’t care what everyone else thinks and neither does he because we know what he have is special in Jimmy Butler.