The Golden State Warriors heaved a sigh of relief after Jimmy Butler did not suffer any fracture or structural damage after his scary fall in their Game 2 loss to the Houston Rockets.
But Boston Celtics great and NBA champion Paul Pierce warns that Butler will never be the same again in the series that puts the Warriors’ playoff run in jeopardy.
“If he has to miss time, it’s over, if he comes back, it won’t be 100 percent,” Pierce said on the “Speak” April 24. “I know that fall, I’ve had that injury before. It’s going to take a couple of weeks. I didn’t miss no time, but it’s a two-week thing before you even get back to feeling like your natural self. It slows you down. At this stage in the playoffs, it’s going to be sore for quite a minute.
“He may play through it, but he won’t be the Jimmy Butler that they need to get them deep into the playoffs.”
Butler’s MRI result came back negative and Golden State coach Steve Kerr shared relative optimism that his prized forward will play in Game 3.
“I’m relatively optimistic,” Kerr told reporters. “I mean, Jimmy is Jimmy. We know he’s willing to play through anything, so we’ll see. I mean, this is a day-to-day thing for sure, and we’ll see how he feels tomorrow, but I think there’s a chance he plays.”
Championship ‘Window is Closed’ With Jimmy Butler Injury
Pierce, however, could not see the Warriors advancing to the NBA Finals with Butler not fully healthy.
“If Jimmy does come back less than 100 percent that’s still not great, you will be playing with an injury, and to say, ‘hey we are trying to get to a NBA Finals and this is going to be a two month thing where I’m not going to really heal’, I’m not sure he can get through that,” Pierce added. “I do believe the window is closed for the Warriors even if he comes back because he won’t be 100 percent.
“It’s devastating. Jimmy Butler’s tough, we know if he can come back in that game, he’s coming back. Jimmy is the type of guy who says I don’t need MRI, I’m good.”
What Injury Experts Say About Jimmy Butler’s Injury
But sports injury expert and certified athletic trainer Jeff Stotts, who operates the website instreetclothes.com, gives the Warriors a glimmer of hope that Pierce’s assessment may be wrong.
“A glute contusion is an ideal outcome for the Warriors forward and one he is familiar with. Butler suffered a glute contusion during the 2023 playoffs and never missed a game. The average time lost for all other glute contusions is 5.2 days (~1.0 game),” Stotts wrote on X.
Butler led an eighth-seed Heat team with lesser talent than this current Warriors iteration to the NBA Finals in 2023.
That optimistic outlook is shared by Dr. Nirav Pandya, a professor at the Orthopedic Surgery department of the University of California, San Francisco and director of sports medicine at Benioff Children’s Hospital.
Dr. Pandya said Butler’s injury typically costs a player to sit out an average of one game. But in Butler’s case, it’s different.
“Now a lot of that data is from the regular season, where there may not necessarily be that big push to have to come back early,” Dr. Pandya said on a video breakdown of Butler’s injury he posted on X. “Obviously, if this happens at playoffs, and pain management can be basically achieved with Jimmy Butler, there could be a chance he could potentially be back for Game 3 or Game 4, based on how his body responds.”
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