The Miami Heat are trading Jimmy Butler to the Golden State Warriors, CBS Sports NBA insider Bill Reiter confirmed. The deal comes on the eve of the 2025 NBA trade deadline and will send Butler to the Bay Area in exchange for Andrew Wiggins, Kyle Anderson and a protected first-round pick. Per reports, the Jazz and Pistons are also part of this multi-team trade. An important trade detail was reported minutes after news of the deal broke: Butler and the Warriors have agreed to a two-year, $111 million contract extension, ESPN reports. The contract runs through the 2026-27 season.
Here’s the reported deal, though it has not yet been finalized.
- Heat receive: Andrew Wiggins, Kyle Anderson, PJ Tucker, 2025 first-round pick
- Warriors receive: Jimmy Butler
- Jazz receive: Dennis Schroder
- Pistons receive: Lindy Waters, Josh Richardson
The Warriors will hope the deal gives Stephen Curry and Draymond Green the veteran co-star that they need to seriously compete for a fifth championship. The Heat get to start fresh after a tumultuous season with their former star forward.
The first rumblings that the Heat were interested in moving Butler came at team president Pat Riley’s end-of-season press conference last spring, in which he indicated that Butler’s limited availability would factor into the team’s willingness to give him a long-term contract extension. Miami ultimately did not give Butler a new deal last summer, and the rumors picked up this season after a slow start for both the player and the team. Butler has a player option after the season and can therefore become a free agent in June, and with the Heat hovering around .500, a move seemingly grew likelier by the day.
When reporting suggested that Butler would prefer a trade in December there was denial on all sides. Butler’s agent, Bernie Lee, publicly disputed the reporting of ESPN’s Shams Charania, and Riley issued a statement saying that Butler would be staying put. “We usually don’t comment on rumors, but all this speculation has become a distraction to the team and is not fair to the players and coaches. Therefore, we will make it clear – We are not trading Jimmy Butler,” Riley wrote.
However, things came to a head following a Jan. 3 win over the New Orleans Pelicans in which team officials reportedly implied that he did not try hardest. A trade request reportedly followed soon after, and on Jan. 4, the Heat suspended Butler seven games for “multiple instances of conduct detrimental to the team over the course of the season and particularly the last several weeks.” He has since been suspended two more times, once for missing a team flight, and then again after walking out of a shootaround. His latest suspension was an indefinite one and Butler has not played since Jan. 21.
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Sam Quinn
Aside from the Suns, the Warriors were the team most frequently linked to Butler on the trade market. Initially, however, reports indicated that talks had broken down over Butler’s hesitance to sign an extension with the Warriors. As the deadline grew closer and a deal to the Suns proved impossible, however, Butler has seemingly warmed up to the idea of a trade to Golden State — and the idea of an extension.
Ironically, the Suns proved vital to this deal on both sides of the equation. This week, the Warriors attempted to trade for Kevin Durant when it seemed as though Butler would be unwilling to sign an extension with them. Talks appeared to be gaining momentum until Durant reportedly made it clear that he was not interested in a return to the Warriors. Miami, meanwhile, reportedly looked into a Durant deal as well, but by making this trade, they seemingly signaled that the Suns had elected not to deal him to them. That meant that the Warriors need a star and Butler, without Durant available to serve as matching salary in a Suns trade, needed a new home. That helped get this trade across the goal line.
This is the third major blockbuster of the 2025 deadline. The Lakers acquired Luka Doncic and sent Anthony Davis to the Mavericks in a stunning deal late Saturday night. The Spurs acquired star guard De’Aaron Fox from the Kings the following night.
Earlier in the season, several key stakeholders in Golden State came out against making a rash, win-now trade. Curry said the Warriors had a responsibility not to make a “desperate” move, and Green said that “bad teams do that.”
As the season progressed, it became clearer and clearer that the Warriors needed a trade of this magnitude. While they started the season 12-3, they have been in decline ever since. The stalled development of their young players, the absence of veterans from last season and the ineffective acquisition of Dennis Schroder (acquired from the Nets in December) made it clear that the Warriors needed a serious talent injection if they hoped to give Curry and Green another shot at a title. Now, in Butler, they’ve landed the most impactful veteran they’ve added since Durant in 2016.