The Warriors have just about landed Dennis Schroder, but the storied franchise may not be done yet as Jimmy Butler is in their sights.
The Warriors are the only team out of the four (Warriors, Rockets, Mavericks and Suns) heavily linked to Himmy Buckets that could eventually lead to “substantive trade talks,” according to NBA insiders Marc Stein and Jake Fischer.
The Warriors are one of Butler’s preferred trade destinations if he were to move away from Miami.
The Rockets and Mavericks are also two teams Butler has interest in being traded to, though both reportedly have not registered a “tangible interest” in pursuit of the 35-year-old, Stein says.
The Warriors are hard-capped at the first apron of the tax bracket.
The team will be left just over $330,000 shy of the limit after the Schroder trade, according to ESPN’s Shams Charania and Bobby Marks.
Butler has $49 million on his contract with the Heat for this season and a $52 million player option for 2025-26, since the Heat and Butler failed to reach an extension last summer.
The Warriors will definitely need to make some room in the cap for a prospective Butler trade.
Andrew Wiggins’ contract is worth $26.3 million this season, so Golden State would need to include other players in the deal such as Jonathan Kuminga,
If the Warriors were to sign Butler, they would be getting him amidst his worst scoring output in five years, averaging 18.6 points in 31.9 minutes per game during the 2024-25 season.
But, is still shooting at the extremely efficient rate of 55 percent from the field.
Pairing Butler with Draymond Green and Steph Curry could prove to be a winning combination, but the Dubs would be throwing away their future for a win-now team.
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