Jimmy Butler’s approach? ‘I’ll do whatever you ask me to do if you guarantee me a win’

Just minutes before the start of Game 3 of the NBA Finals, Miami Heat All-Star Jimmy Butler said during an on-court interview with ESPN’s Rachel Nichols: “We get one tonight, we might be up to something.”

The Heat got one Sunday, but it remains to be seen if it is indeed up to something.

Behind a historic triple-double performance from Butler, the shorthanded Heat earned a much-needed win in Game 3 to avoid a 3-0 series deficit and narrow the Los Angeles Lakers’ series lead to 2-1. For Miami to prove it’s up to something, it now has to string together a second consecutive win in Game 4 on Tuesday (9 p.m., ABC).

A Game 4 loss would put the Heat in a 3-1 hole, which not many teams have overcome. NBA teams that take a 3-1 lead win their series 95 percent (246-13) of the time, which essentially makes Tuesday another must-win situation for Miami.

It’s still unclear whether starting center Bam Adebayo (neck strain) and/or starting guard Goran Dragic (torn plantar fascia in left foot) will play Tuesday, as both already missed Games 2 and 3 of the series. But Adebayo was upgraded to questionable for Game 4, while Dragic remains doubtful for the contest.

Whether Adebayo and/or Dragic return or not, Butler will need to continue his exceptional play for the Heat to rally in the series against the Lakers.

“For us to be able to accomplish what we want to accomplish, you can’t just be normal, you have to be extraordinary,” Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said Monday of Butler. “He’s shouldering major responsibilities on both sides of the floor. This is what he’s always wanted as a competitor. This is what we want from him.”

Butler has been magnificent in his first career Finals appearance, averaging a series-high 29.3 points on 58 percent shooting, seven rebounds and a series-high 10.3 assists in 41 minutes through the first three games.

Those averages include the best performance of Butler’s NBA career, as he willed the desperate and undermanned Heat to a win with 40 points on 14-of-20 shooting from the field and 12-of-14 shooting from the foul line, 11 rebounds, 13 assists, two steals and two blocks.

Butler, 31, became just the third player in NBA history to record a 40-point triple-double in the Finals, joining Jerry West (1969 Finals) and LeBron James (2015 Finals) on that list. Butler also joined James as the only two Heat players in franchise history to finish a Finals game with a triple-double.

“He’s our max player. We expect him to do max player things,” Adebayo said of Butler. “I’ve always liked Jimmy’s game. But seeing it up close and being his teammate, it’s crazy to watch because of how much work he puts in behind the scenes that nobody knows about. ... It’s not shocking to me that he had a 40-point triple-double. That doesn’t shock me. I’m just proud of him because he really put the team on his back and really wanted that win.”

One of the most impressive aspects of Butler’s Game 3 takeover was how he got his points.

Butler scored a career-high 26-paint points on 13-of-16 shooting on Sunday, and that attacking style led to him drawing 11 fouls that resulted in 14 free-throw attempts in Game 3. He joined James Worthy, Magic Johnson and Scottie Pippen as the only players to notch a triple-double in the Finals without attempting a three-pointer since the three-point shot was adopted by the NBA in 1979.

According to Elias Sports, Butler scored or assisted on 73 points Sunday. That’s tied for the second-most in a Finals game in NBA history behind only Walt Frazier, who scored or assisted on 74 points in Game 7 of the 1970 Finals.

“I think if you just constantly try to evaluate him and put him in a box with the conventional thinking of basketball, you’re just only going to get confused,” Spoelstra said of Butler. “He’s an elite competitor. He’s a great basketball player and it’s attached to how he impacts winning, not to this modern day definition of three-point percentage or three-and-D, all these little terms you hear. He’s a throwback.”

As expected, Butler’s usage rate (the percentage of a team’s possessions that a player, while he’s on the court, ends with a shot, free-throw attempt or turnover) has gone up with Adebayo and Dragic out. Butler has a usage rate of 25 percent this postseason, but it has jumped to 30.5 percent over Games 2 and 3 of the Finals.

Butler also had the ball for 11.7 minutes in Game 3, according to the NBA’s tracking stats, representing just how much he carried the Heat’s offense. That’s significantly more than his average time of possession (5.9 minutes) this postseason.

While Butler is known for preferring to play a more collective style offensively, Spoelstra said jokingly: “We don’t care what he thinks about that right now. We’re way past that now. There’s no turning back. He has to make some things happen for us.”

“I think they know what buttons to press to get me to play the way that they want me to play,” Butler said when told of Spoelstra’s comment. “But I just want to win. I don’t think [scoring and shooting a lot of shots] is just winning basketball all the time. I don’t. I think winning basketball is Duncan [Robinson] is going to go off for six or seven threes, Tyler [Herro] can do that, [Kendrick Nunn] can do that, Jae [Crowder] is going to have a big night. We’re all locked in defensively. To me those are the best wins.”

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But Butler wasn’t just dominant on the offensive end. With Miami switching its primary defensive coverage from zone to man in Game 3, Butler also found himself defending James for most of the game and he did it relatively well.

According to the NBA’s tracking stats, James scored nine points on six shots and committed seven turnovers during the 32 possessions he was defended by Butler on Sunday.

Butler did all of this while playing 45 of the 48 minutes in Game 3, and he also played 45 of the 48 minutes in Game 2.

In the past two games without Adebayo and Dragic, the Heat has outscored the Lakers by 17 points in the 90 minutes that Butler has been on the court. Los Angeles has outscored Miami by 16 points in the six minutes he has been on the bench.

On Sunday, Butler was the best player in a game that featured the Lakers’ All-Star duo of Anthony Davis and James.

Davis and James combined to finish Game 3 with 40 points, 15 rebounds and 11 assists. Butler, alone, scored that many points, grabbed only four fewer rebounds and dished out two more assists.

“When it comes to competing, he’s wired a little bit differently,” Butler’s agent Bernie Lee said to the Miami Herald at the start of the postseason. “I think I’m putting that mildly. With the playoffs, you’re so close to whatever your goal is. For him, I think he’s wired like every high-level elite person doing something in life. Once you get closer to the finish line, your focus kind of locks in a little bit more. He realizes. You give him a smaller window and you say, ‘Look, over the course of these next 14 days, this is what you have to do four times. Can you figure it out?’ Yeah, he definitely lives for that challenge.”

It’ll be hard for Butler to duplicate Sunday’s stat line considering it’s undoubtedly one of the best in Heat and Finals history. But the Heat will need another dominant performance from Butler in Game 4 — especially if Adebayo and/or Dragic can’t play — to prove it’s “up to something” in the series.

“It’s all about winning,” Butler said. “I’ll do whatever you ask me to do if you guarantee me a win. I realize that nothing is guaranteed. But I’ll do whatever you ask me to do to put my team in the best position to win. That’s it.”