Warriors? Bucks? Sixers? Suns? Analyzing possible Jimmy Butler trade destinations

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A theme has emerged as the Jimmy Butler saga nears its first and maybe final landmark: The NBA is proceeding with caution.

Butler wants out of Miami, and the Heat want out of the Butler business, suspending him three times in January for conduct detrimental to the team. They have fielded offers for the six-time All-Star since he demanded a new home earlier this season. But with the Feb. 6 trade deadline looming this week — and with one superstar swap already off the board with the Mavericks and Lakers exchanging Luka Dončić and Anthony Davis this weekend — not every front office is diving into negotiations headfirst.

The Grizzlies, for example, have held exploratory talks with Miami about Butler, but those interactions haven’t gone far. According to league sources, the Heat asked about Memphis’ young players, which the Grizzlies rebuffed.

Memphis hasn’t made an official offer for Butler and is hesitant to part with any of its promising youth or draft picks of consequence, league sources said. A hypothetical Butler package would include matching salaries and not much more. The Grizzlies could hardly turn the Heat back into a juggernaut, but they could help Miami accomplish one of its goals in a Butler negotiation: opening up cap room in 2026.

Yet, Memphis’ supposed package (which could include a mix of Marcus Smart, Luke Kennard, Brandon Clarke, Jake LaRavia and John Konchar) exists only on the trade machines.

Heading into Sunday’s game against the Milwaukee Bucks, the Grizzlies are 32-16, third in the Western Conference. They have chased after big wings over the years, making a play for Mikal Bridges around the time the Suns traded him to Brooklyn for Kevin Durant and another for OG Anunoby before the Raptors dealt him to the Knicks. They reached deep negotiations earlier this season for Dorian Finney-Smith before the Lakers swept in for the 3-and-D threat.

Butler is another big wing, though integrating his bully-ball style would add a fascinating contrast to the way the Grizzlies play. Memphis slices defenses with off-ball cuts and runs less pick-and-roll than any other NBA team. Acquiring Butler, who can become a free agent after this season, could create more cap flexibility for Memphis.

Let’s jump 400 steps ahead and pretend the Grizzlies actually do acquire the 35-year-old star. Butler has let it be known that his trade list includes 28 organizations: everyone except Miami, of course — and, according to league sources, Memphis. If he were to decline his $52 million player option for 2025-26, then the Grizzlies could create cap space this summer, giving them room to renegotiate and extend All-Star big man Jaren Jackson Jr., who enters the final year of his contract next season.

But the Grizzlies haven’t even placed a concrete offer in front of Miami yet. It’s possible they never do.

Butler’s future remains in flux. He wanted an extension. Miami wouldn’t give it to him. Now, he wants a trade. So do the Heat. In this environment — with a restrictive collective bargaining agreement strangling free agency and without many big players who have cap room this summer — his best chance to get a massive contract this summer is if whatever team he’s on pays to bring him back.

But does he end up in another city by Feb. 6? Or does Miami scoff at low-ball offers and hold onto him anyway, furthering the drama in South Beach? And if they do, how does Butler handle that? How long does the rest of his currently indefinite suspension linger? And what does he do about that $52 million player option in 2025-26 if he has no worthwhile suitors come the summer?

The Heat have scoured the league, attempting to find someone who will give them value for a player who has led them to the NBA Finals multiple times. And yet, with less than a week until the Feb. 6 trade deadline, the Butler market remains a mystery. On one side of the spectrum is the Grizzlies, who are monitoring the situation but doing not much more. On the other is an enthusiastic wooer, such as the Suns, who want Butler but may be in too restrictive a cap situation to pull it off.

Here is a look at four more teams in the running for Butler, how a deal with each could happen and what obstacles are in the way:

Golden State Warriors

What an interesting inflection point it is for these Warriors and general manager Mike Dunleavy Jr.

It has been 20 months since Bob Myers stepped down from the top front office position, having played a pivotal role in the building of their dynasty before choosing to walk away before the messy decline. While money and stamina for the job were the biggest factors in Myers’ decision, it’s also true that he preferred to avoid these uncomfortable days that are now unfolding without him. The task of surrounding Steph Curry with the proper amount of talent in his twilight years, while also building for the future, is indeed quite daunting.

So here the Warriors are at peak mediocrity, in 11th place in the West with a record of 24-24. Dunleavy, who certainly needs to honor the views of the power brokers who came before him, must also decide if the time has come for him to simply do what he believes is best.

“We’re not in a position where we can just say, ‘No, we’re good,’ and stand pat,” head coach Steve Kerr admitted after the Warriors’ blowout loss to Phoenix on Friday night. “That’s the reality of where we are. So, Mike’s doing his due diligence, doing his job. If there’s something that makes sense, he’s going to do it. If not, then I’m very comfortable going forward with this team because I know what we’re capable of, and I believe in the guys.”

So … does that mean Butler, or perhaps Chicago’s Zach LaVine or Nikola Vučević, are a priority to bring to town? That much remains to be seen.

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As our Anthony Slater and Marcus Thompson reported on Wednesday, there are clearly concerns within the locker room regarding two aspects of a possible Butler deal: Who they might have to give up (Andrew Wiggins), and the difficult dynamics that might come with the 35-year-old player who takes his place. Butler’s desire for a max extension with Miami has been a driving force behind his dysfunctional relationship with his current team, so how might he react if he’s, in essence, a rental for these Warriors?

Then again, there’s an argument to be made that Butler might embrace the chance to help save this storied team while setting himself up for one last payday at the end of next season (assuming he picks up his player option). And don’t forget, as others have noted, that Dunleavy played with Butler during his time with the Chicago Bulls and thus has first-hand knowledge of his proverbial fabric.

The Warriors weren’t interested in Butler a month ago, when the Heat’s price was higher and their sense of desperation lower. But things change quickly in this league, so the prospect of Butler donning a Warriors jersey is most certainly in play at the moment because, well, the landscape is different now. As Slater and Thompson wrote, there has been “a noticeable increase in intrigue from the front office about the idea of Butler at a bargain.”

As for LaVine, who league sources say would welcome the chance to play for the Warriors, he may ultimately prove to be the better fit. The 29-year-old is owed $45.9 million next season, and has a player option worth $48.9 million for the 2026-27 campaign. He’s having a fantastic year, averaging 24 points per game while shooting at a career-high pace (51.1 percent overall and 44.6 percent from 3, on 7.3 attempts per game). He’s also averaging 4.8 rebounds and 4.5 assists. After playing just 25 games during the 2023-24 season because of right foot surgery, LaVine has missed just six of the Bulls’ 48 games this time around.

League sources say the talks between the Warriors and Bulls regarding Vučević are very real, with the 34-year-old center intriguing the Warriors brass with his steady production (19.8 points, 10.3 rebounds and 3.4 assists per game). That deal, if it were to come together, would likely allow them to hold onto Wiggins (Warriors Kevon Looney, Gary Payton II and Kyle Anderson are believed to be the players of focus in those talks). And, as is the case with LaVine, all signs point to Vučević being enthused about this potential partnership.

Phoenix Suns

Whoever came up with vision boards didn’t know about the NBA’s collective bargaining agreement.

The Suns have attempted to will a Butler trade into existence. They’ve expressed interest in him from the beginning, contacting the Heat to gauge the market. But Phoenix is in a difficult spot, not just financially but also schematically.

Phoenix has ballooned above the second apron, a payroll threshold far into the luxury tax that limits flexibility. The Suns are not allowed to include more than one player in the same trade or take in more salary than they trade elsewhere. Because of that, their best offer for Butler is easy to decipher — mostly because it’s the only one they can make.

They’re not flipping Kevin Durant or Devin Booker. Instead, it would have to be Bradley Beal.

But Beal owns a no-trade clause, which enables him to veto any deal, a power he is willing to wield. His first priority is his family, according to a source familiar with his thinking. Beal, his wife and two kids moved from Washington to Los Angeles and then full-time to Phoenix all in the past couple of years. A trade would mean either uprooting his two sons once again or leaving them to play elsewhere.

Beal is willing to waive his no-trade clause, the source said, but the list is not long. He would need to go to a winning team that is also in an appealing city. Cold weather has never been his favorite, though he would make exceptions if the basketball situation were appealing enough.

Miami fits that description. Yet, there’s another issue: The Heat, hoping to open up cap room by the summer of 2026, don’t want him. Beal will make $110 million over the two seasons after this one. So, if the Suns want Butler, they need to include at least one more team in the trade, which isn’t simple. After all, Phoenix made a grand statement about its thoughts on Beal earlier this month, when it moved the three-time All-Star to the bench.

The Suns can trade as many as three first-round picks, but each one (because of swap rights on them) projects to be late in Round 1. Even if there were a team willing to accept Beal’s contract for those sweeteners, it would probably be a rebuilding one, which would most-likely eliminate it from Beal’s list. For example, The Athletic reported earlier this week that Beal would not accept a trade to the Bulls.

Unless Phoenix can find a home that both wants a reserve on a max contract and that Beal is willing to approve, a deal for Butler can’t occur. Wishing upon a star, no matter how disgruntled that star may be, doesn’t always work.

Pairing Butler with Giannis Antetokounmpo would cost the Bucks Khris Middleton, and would be complicated by cap issues. (Benny Sieu / USA TODAY Sports via Imagn Images)

Milwaukee Bucks

Bucks general manager Jon Horst has never been afraid of taking a big swing.

Horst did it before the 2020-21 season when he traded Eric Bledsoe, George Hill, three first-round picks and two first-round pick swaps to the Pelicans for Jrue Holiday. That deal changed the Bucks’ ceiling and helped propel the organization to their first NBA championship since 1971. And he did it again in the 2023 offseason when he shocked the basketball world by flipping Holiday and Grayson Allen, plus a first-round pick and two first-round pick swaps for All-Star point guard Damian Lillard.

But while trading for Jimmy Butler is the type of move Horst has shown the capability of making in the past, this one would be far more difficult and complicated than either of the two blockbuster deals he pulled off previously. In those situations, Horst was able to work in the shadows, as he prefers, and then make a big offer with players to match salaries and enough draft capital to get a deal done. This one would not be the same.

As shown in the Suns section above, the new CBA has drastically complicated any deal that the Bucks and Heat might think about making. Miami is above the first apron. Milwaukee is above the second. That means neither can take on a dollar more than it sends out. So, that means they require the addition of at least a third team, if not a fourth team, to take on money.

From a purely Bucks perspective, if they want to join Butler with Giannis Antetokounmpo and Damian Lillard, they would need to aggregate the contracts of multiple players to reach Butler’s $48.8 million salary. But because they are a second-apron team, a trade with aggregated contacts would only be legal if the result of the trade takes the Bucks under the second apron, so that means finding a way to put together enough salary to cut at least $6.5 million with the addition of Butler and have enough space to sign as many players as needed to keep a legal roster for the rest of the season.

In the end, a package of Khris Middleton, Bobby Portis and Pat Connaughton would “work” from a cap perspective, but the Bucks would need to ask themselves if that deal is worthwhile. Butler is quite an enigma. What level of effort would he bring to Milwaukee? How would he affect the locker room?

On top of that, would the Bucks even feel comfortable making a deal that weakens their three-man rotation of big men? The Bucks just went 1-3 on a four-game Western Conference road trip without Bobby Portis, who missed the trip for personal reasons. Bucks coach Doc Rivers ended the trip talking about how vital Portis is because the Bucks only have three big men and how he felt Brook Lopez was overworked without Portis. Antetokounmpo discussed how much more difficult it is to play center than power forward.

And, while Kerr talked about the Warriors’ need to make a move, Rivers did the opposite following a practice on Thursday in San Antonio.

“I think we’re in a great place,” Rivers said. “We don’t need to do a thing. Jon’s job is to try to improve our team, but from a coach’s standpoint, if we do nothing, I’m very happy.”

It’s sort of unbelievable to think we’ve reached a place where the Bucks would have to debate whether or not it would be a smart move to add “Jimmy Buckets,” the guy that was almost singlehandedly responsible for eliminating the Bucks from the 2023 playoffs and ending the Mike Budenholzer era in Milwaukee, but that just speaks to the uncertainty that surrounds Butler at the moment.

Philadelphia 76ers

Not even two years ago, Joel Embiid wrote yet another viral tweet about his former teammate.

Not long after Butler dropped a career-best 56 points on the Bucks, a performance that helped eighth-seeded Miami to a 3-1 series lead over top-of-the-league Milwaukee, Embiid locked into all-caps mode.

“PLAYOFF MF HIMMY BUTLER,” he tweeted.

This message was not a one-off.

Butler and Embiid played together for the latter part of 2018-19, when the 76ers traded for Butler only a couple of weeks into the schedule. They fell in the second round of the playoffs after Kawhi Leonard’s Game 7 baseline jumper touched each part of the rim and then broke every heart in Philadelphia. Butler played only 55 games plus a playoff run in Philly, but Embiid has been adamant since their stretch together: Butler is one of his all-time favorite teammates.

It hasn’t been so sunny in Philadelphia without Butler, especially this season.

The Sixers are 19-28, the league’s most disappointing squad after signing Paul George over the summer. On paper, George, Embiid and Tyrese Maxey were a daunting big three. In reality, they haven’t played together much, only 10 games — and when they have, it hasn’t gone well.

If the 76ers were to get into the running for Butler, the only intuitive offer (for salary-cap reasons) would include George, who has underwhelmed so far this season and is under contract for three more max-salaried years after this one. But the length of his contract presents the same issues as Beal’s does: Miami doesn’t want to take anyone who’s still on the books in 2026-27. George will make $54.1 million that season and has an even more expensive player option for the next one.

Could the two sides find a third team to take George and make the money work? Maybe. Of course, do they even want to get to that point?

As of now, there is no hard evidence that the Sixers are in on the chase, just media speculation about how they might be contemplating an 11th-hour pursuit.

Butler was in a similar situation when they traded for him in 2018, blowing up the Timberwolves because he wanted an extension the team was yet to hand him. After an uncomfortable training camp, Minnesota dealt him to the Sixers for a smattering of role players, matching salary and not much more.

Six and a half years later, Butler is feuding with the Heat. The offers for him today, even the hypothetical ones, look familiar.

(Top photo: Issac Baldizon / NBAE via Getty Images)