9 minute read
COVER STORY
134
112 HAUTE JOAILLERIE
Haute holiday joaillerie
134 HAUTE TRAVEL
Warm and cold weather destinations for the ultimate winter vacation
140 HAUTE BEAUTY
Redefining the plastic surgery experience with
Dr. Jose Rodríguez-Feliz, and all the details on Chloe
Long’s skin care line, Emerald
Ray Botanicals
172 HAUTE CUISINE
An inside look at Major Food
Group’s new Miami Design
District eatery, Contessa
30
HAUTE TIME
140
HAUTE BEAUTY
173 SPECIAL FEATURE
A handy guide to the best of
Art Basel
174 HAUTE PARTNERS
Attorney Paul Samakow shares how to stay warm, but keep safe
176 HAUTE SCENE
The hottest Haute Living events of the season
THREE YEARS INTO HIS TIME WITH THE HEAT, JIMMY BUTLER, OUR MOST INFLUENTIAL ATHLETE, HAS FIRMLY FOUND HIS FOOTING IN MIAMI. AND THOUGH FATHERHOOD HAS MADE HIM SOFTER, HIS DESIRE TO CRUSH EVERYTHING IS STRONGER THAN EVER.
BY LAURA SCHREFFLER PHOTOGRAPHY EDWIN JEAN & THEO SMITH SHOT ON LOCATION IN MIAMI
t’s been three years since I first encountered Jimmy Butler, before he had even officially donned his No. 22 Miami Heat jersey, and in that time, much has changed — in his life, and in general (hello, we lived through a pandemic). But one thing definitely has not: his desire to win.
Anyone who knows the six-time NBA All-Star knows that I’m not just talking about basketball: he needs to excel at everything.
I mean, things change, and this could have too, I suppose. But a fairly recent conversation with his close friend Alexander “Sascha” Zverev reassured me that it hadn’t. The German tennis champion served up a description of legendary guys’ nights at Butler’s South Miami pad that revolve around fine wine, poker, Padel, dominos, and a lot of losing (on his part, and that includes not only the games themselves, but money and self-respect, too, from the sound of it).
The gauntlet Zverev throws down is this: the house always wins because the house makes up the rules as it goes along. (“The house” here, if you didn’t get it already, is Jimmy.) But then, who can really know the truth, especially when the story involves two fiercely competitive professional athletes who refuse to see themselves as losers in any situation? Butler says as much now, recalling a conversation they had over the summer. “I picked up the phone and said, ‘Hey Sash, what’s up?’ He was like, ‘Remember when I whooped your ass at cards?’ I was like, ‘I actually don’t remember that. I remember me whooping your ass at cards.’ This is the brotherhood that we have — we don’t really care how each other’s doing. We just gotta remind each other who’s better.”
He’s kind of joking, and also kind of not, but one thing is true: despite their mutual desire to be the best, theirs is a true friendship. “That’s my guy right there, that’s my guy. And he can hoop, I’ve got to give him credit,” Butler says. Which is nice, right? But then: “I can’t wait for him to come play tennis at my house. [The rules are going to be that] you must play with your feet — you cannot play with your hands. I will win at all costs. That’s why I love Sascha so much — because he doesn’t back down from any challenge. Like, he thinks he can actually beat me at basketball, and I think I can beat him at tennis; this is the battle that we constantly have. We can’t go three sentences without it turning into a competition every single time he calls.”
Which makes me wonder: could Butler beat Zverev, who is currently the ATP’s No. 6 world-ranked player, at his own game? Butler spent his summer taking tennis lessons, among many other things, so watch this space. I would not be at all surprised if his competitive drive kicked into action to secure that “W.” I also know that Zverev’s “the house always wins” analysis was correct. “That’s how you’re supposed to do it. Those are the house rules, and the house rules are always catered to make me win. Like, that’s a given,” Butler declares in response.
So yeah, the 33-year-old basketball star is all about putting in the hard work, but he’s not above making up illogical, Mad Hatter-style games with fluid rules to get the end result, either. Same-same, but different. “People will come up with anything and make up anything to find a way to say that I did not win. So they’ll say, ‘You changed all the rules, he creates the rules as he goes along,’” he says, innocently enough. Cue the fake halo now. “But it’s not documented, and if it is documented, I’m the one that documented it. So, as far as I can tell, I play a fair game. I just always win. That’s how you’ve got to do it.”
Fair or foul, Butler gets the job done. His track record with the Heat is living proof: in his first year, he helped lead his team to the NBA Finals, and in the 2021-2022 season, he led them all the way to the Eastern Conference Finals — before a heartbreaking Game 7 loss to the Boston Celtics. But the past is the past, and Butler is all about the future, eagerly anticipating the opportunity to dominate on the court once again. And come October 19 — the Heat’s first game of the regular season, against the Chicago Bulls — he’ll get that chance. He says now, “I’ve had lots of rest, lots of recovery, lots of working out. Like I tell everybody, I work on everything in the off-season; I don’t think anybody is surprised by what I do on the basketball floor. This is about maintaining, finding ways to make myself better, and, more importantly, making my teammates better, making them more comfortable, and more confident, because I’m always going to need those guys.”
He expounds on this sentiment, saying, “It’s a blessing to be able to wake up and just hoop every day. Like, that’s my job, but not really my job, because I really love the opportunities that I have, the players I get to share the floor with, the coach I get to play for, the management, the ownership. It’s fun for me. I get excited to wake up and do this every day. I’m excited by the opportunity that we have ahead of us. The guys are ready. I mean, PJ Tucker is a traitor… I hate you PJ Tucker! I’m kidding, that’s my guy,” he
I WILL WIN AT ALL COSTS.”
SHIRT & SHORTS: BIGFACE WATCH: Tag Heuer SHOES: Li-Ning jokes of his friend and former team member, who left the Heat to play with the Philadelphia 76ers, adding, “But seriously, I think we’ve got a really good opportunity to become a championship caliber team.”
Tucker’s departure aside, the Heat are in a good position to contend again this year, with the strength of returning players like Kyle Lowry, Bam Adebayo, Victor Oladipo, and Tyler Herro. And Butler, of course, all 6-feet7-inches of his six-time NBA All-Star, 2016 Olympic Gold Medalist, five-time All-Defensive Team selection, four-time All-NBA Team honoree self.
As he says of both his teammates and his fans: “We’ve got some hardworking mother-effers down here in Miami that just love to win, love to have fun, and love that sunshine. That’s how the Miami people are, and that’s me for you in a nutshell,” he declares. “[That’s why] I want to finish my career here. I want to bring a championship here, as I say time and time again. I’m not going anywhere.”
I don’t know about you, but I wouldn’t place my bets against him (or his $184 million, four-year contract extension, either): the odds, after all, are in his favor.
ow, let’s talk about how Jimmy Butler has changed — N because truly, he has.
But to understand this change, we need to rewind a beat, go back in time. The year is 2019, pre-pandemic. I meet Butler, then freshly 30, at a swanky hotel in London’s upscale Knightsbridge neighborhood. He’s living there for the summer, using it as a launchpad for his global adventures. He’s young, hungry to win, and hell-bent on soaking up as much experience as possible: imbibing in Bordeaux, enjoying a feeding frenzy in Venice, learning how to samba in Rio de Janeiro. He’s full of fire to make it rain for the Heat in Miami.
But then, his daughter was born — and his life changed completely.
“I literally became a dad on opening night of my first year here, and so my life has taken a turn for the better. Honestly, I don’t think it can get any better than this,” he insists on a sunny Saturday morning in September, ten days after his 33rd birthday, and three before the start of training camp at Baha Mar in the Bahamas. “Now, I’m in dad mode any time I’m not in between all four lines on the basketball court.” (I mean, he did just return from a big ass birthday trip in Europe, living it up in Switzerland and France, but I see his point.)
What that involves is a lot of love, a lot of patience, and a lot of coffee. Right now, for example, it’s 11 a.m. and he’s on his fourth cup. And if you think that’s a lot, wait for it — he’s usually drinks up to ten a day.
“I need it. I need it,” he declares. “I’m telling you, you don’t know my child. My child is a handful and a half. I’m surprised that she’s not out here throwing something at the back of my head right now. That’s literally my daughter. And she’ll laugh and lie to you and say she didn’t do it. Like, it’s bad. So come to think of it, I probably need 32 cups of coffee.”
Is this learned behavior? I wonder (out loud). Unapologetically, even proudly, he confirms it probably is. “I definitely throw stuff at her while she’s watching TV, and then I’ll point at my brother or at her mom or whoever else,” he admits.
Another learned behavior is perhaps his biggest struggle. Fatherhood, more than anything, has taught him that he needs to watch his mouth, lest someone try to wash it out with soap. “[Being a parent has mostly taught me] that I need to watch what I say, because I say a lot of bad words on the daily, and I don’t realize it, but it’s because I’m normally in a competitive environment or somebody’s getting on my nerves. It’s like, my daughter’s not paying attention to anything until somebody says bad words. You can say every word in the English dictionary and she won’t repeat it until she hears the ones you’re not supposed to say. It’s like her brain knows. She gets me every single time.”
