Jimmy Butler had an astounding Wednesday. A “vociferous” Jimmy finally showed up to practice after three weeks of absence, humiliated his teammates in scrimmages, hurled dung at his coach, hollered at his GM, left the Wolves in a daze, then slid into the studio for a slick ESPN tell-all, and probably penciled in a mani-pedi and deep tissue massage somewhere in there, too. What a day. Butler lit the Wolves on fire so the whole world could see, and now, with all eyeballs on them, the team has chosen to ... cancel today’s practice and skip media availability.
Also, an important new item to file under Things I Desperately Want To Believe About Jimmy Butler: befriending Mark Wahlberg changed the trajectory of his life for the worse. From a new Star Tribune column:
There was insight sought from a Chicago media person who had watched Butler from the start of his career. The suggestion was that Jimmy came into the league driven by his underdog status, and that changed a few years later when he started hanging out with Wahlberg and seeing himself as a star.
The feeling in Chicago was that Butler’s game stopped growing three, four years ago, as his head grew ever larger.
No matter how comically vague the sourcing, no matter how big a factual stretch, I think we can all agree that this is True in the cosmic sense. Jimmy Butler is this way because of Mark Wahlberg.