Heat’s Jimmy Butler on verge of ultimate theft recognition as NBA steals leader

The Miami Heat won’t know their playoff seed until after Sunday’s games, but they already know they will have an NBA champion.

Averaging 2.08 steals per game going into Saturday night’s road matchup against the Milwaukee Bucks, Jimmy Butler will become the first player in the Heat’s 33 seasons to lead the league in steals.

For years, the Heat have stressed positional defense over gambling for steals. But since Butler’s arrival in the 2019 offseason, coach Erik Spoelstra has moved to a more aggressive approach.

“There’s a lot of incredibly unique things about JB as a defender and a lot of them may be contradictory,” Spoelstra said ahead of the Heat’s closing schedule. “Because I think the fans maybe see the, ‘leading the league in steals,’ and you see the picks and some of the trickery where he’s in a passing lane, that you don’t even see it before it’s happening. And he has great anticipation and closing speed.

“But he’s also old school. Just line him up against the other team’s best player, mano a mano, and take that challenge.”

In other words, it is not a case of a player chasing steals at the cost of defensive positioning. It is a matter of establishing the defensive positioning so that the steals follow.

“Whatever your defensive schemes may be,” Spoelstra said, “he’s very disciplined and he has been true to that in all the defensive systems that he has been in over the course of his career. He has been able to adapt and find a way to make an impact.”

Butler’s previous highest steals average was 2.0 in 2017-18 with the Minnesota Timberwolves. The highest average by a Heat player was Dwyane Wade’s 2.19 in 2008-09, when he finished second in the NBA to Chris Paul’s 2.8 per game.

Butler went into the weekend as the Heat’s all-time leader in steals per game, at 1.92, with Sherman Douglas second, at 1.70, LeBron James third, at 1.66. Wade finished his Heat career averaging 1.57 per game.

For Butler, it has been a case of setting a tone from the outset, with a career-high seven steals on opening night, against the Orlando Magic on Dec. 23, the most ever in a Heat opener. He now has recorded at least 100 steals in eight consecutive seasons, tying James Harden’s longest active streak in the NBA, with Harden’s streak to end this season.

“You got to get in the passing lane, make their passes difficult, contest every shot,” Butler said.

No other Heat player entered the weekend close to any other statistical leadership, with the Heat’s closest in the other categories being Butler 26th in scoring, Bam Adebayo 15th in rebounding, Butler 10th in assists, Adebayo 12th in field-goal percentage, Duncan Robinson 39th in 3-point percentage, Butler 33rd in free-throw percentage, Adebayo 23rd in blocks and Butler 30th in minutes per game.

As for Butler, Spoelstra said in a typical season, the perspective might have been far different, particularly had it not been for the 10 games Butler missed due to NBA pandemic protocols.

“I think if we had a complete year and a full year and health and everything, yeah Jimmy Butler, in my mind, has to be in that conversation for MVP,” Spoelstra said. “I think his game is just continuing to grow. That’s as a winner, as a throwback player, a guy that really impacts the game on both ends of the court. He truly does. It’s not just talk.

“He has as much of an impact on the defensive side as he does the offensive side.”

Work in progress

Added Friday as a developmental prospect, 7-foot Omer Yurtseven said his goal is to impress the Heat as a stretch big man.

“I evolved from what kind of player I was to what the league’s four and fives are demanded to do at this stage,” he said “I think I can stretch the floor and I can be helpful on that end. Also, I can defend and rebound. I showed it in the G League.”

The former North Carolina State and Georgetown center, who went undrafted last year, was in training camp with the Oklahoma City Thunder and then spent the G League season with their affiliate.

Yurtseven, 22, said he has been working with Heat video coordinator Dan Bisaccio, having gone through NBA protocol testing this past week.

He is playoff eligible, although not on the Heat’s weekend trip. He becomes the franchise’s first player to wear No. 77.

Current Heat centers Dewayne Dedmon and Nemanja Bjelica are on expiring contracts.