Jimmy Butler Breaks Shaquille O’Neal’s Playoffs Faith, Forcing TNT Host to Take a Stance

Miami Heat secured a hard-fought playoff spot with a win against the Chicago Bulls. But Miami’s odds are thrown out of the loop due to Jimmy Butler’s MCL injury. He’s expected to be out of the rotation for at least two weeks. With Butler, the Heat have reached two Finals in the last 4 years and became just the second 8th seed to reach the Finals last year. But without Jimmy, that seems like a long shot. The situation even made Shaquille O’Neal change his pick from his former championship-winning team to another team he played for.

Shaquille O’Neal repeatedly asked Ernie Johnson, “When is Jimmy coming home?” But Charles Barkley added, “He’s not.” So when Ernie asked Shaq who he’s putting his money between Miami and Boston when they meet in the first round, O’Neal initially picked Miami. But he asked, “When is Jimmy coming back?” again. His co-hosts said he’s done for the season, which made Shaq repeatedly chant, “Boston, Boston.” That’s got to sting.

This same week, Shaq was hinging all his hopes for Miami on Butler. Ahead of their play-in bid, Chuck was rooting for the 76ers. That’s when his nemesis said, “Don’t ever count out Jimmy Butler and the Heat.” Shaq even slammed his car keys on the table to show he’s betting his car on the Heat forward.

However, it’s time to discount Butler out of playoff contention. During the game against the Sixers, Kelly Oubre Jr. fouled him hard. Butler stayed in the game and scored 19 points. Not enough to win though as Heat lost 104-105 (no word on if Chuck drove out of work with Shaq’s car). Butler was seen limping out of the court with an MCL sprain then.

He missed the next game in which the Heat won 112-91 over the Bulls. The team said he will miss several weeks to recover. While Tyler Herro is carrying the scoring charge, it’s hard to tell if he and Jaime Jaquez Jr. would be enough to make up for Butler’s offense. For Shaq, it might not.

Shaquille O’Neal flip-flops

He’s allowed to change his opinion depending on the circumstances like all of us. It doesn’t spare him from online debates for clashing. Following the final rounds of the play-in tournament, the TNT guys offered their picks for the playoffs. Between #1 seeded Celtics and #8 Miami, it’s hard not to see why Shaq picked Boston. But only a week ago, he called the Celtics the most overrated team in the league.

He also changed his opinion to Chuck’s side, picking the #7 Sixers over the second-seeded Knicks. But that also may have to do with both sleeping on the Knicks. Among his other first-round picks for the East, he has Pacers over the Bucks and Orlando over Cleveland.

His choices are bold and indefensible. It remains to be seen if his predictions will be proven as wrong as what he made for the play-ins.