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Jimmy Butler didn't like that Damian Lillard ended up with the Milwaukee Bucks instead of the Miami Heat. Lillard joined Milwaukee as part of a three-team trade with the Portland Trail Blazers and Phoenix Suns, despite naming Miami as his preferred destination. Thus, Butler took to social media and called out the Bucks, accusing them of tampering.
Butler said on an Instagram story on Wednesday:
"Yo NBA man, y'all need to look into the Bucks for tampering. You all do. I'm just going to put that out there. Y'all didn't hear it from me, but I heard it from somebody"
His video quickly went viral, with fans reacting to his comments and either accusing him and the Heat for tampering as well or calling him a 'snitch'.
One user even brought up the conspiracy theory of Jimmy Butler being Michael Jordan's son:
"His officially MJ son, hating is the DNA," the user tweeted.
"This man went straight to snitching HAHAHAHA," another user wrote.
"He’s so mad he’s snitching," a fan posted.
"Y’all didn’t hear it from me" - *posts video to millions of fans*," a Twitter user wrote.
"Bro Started Snitching," another one said.
"Bro live snitching is wild," another user tweeted.
"NBA's first snitch Jimmy Butler," another one said.
"Jimmy when he tried to tamper and it didn’t work out so whoever got dame must have tampered," another user tweeted.
"This guy has been talking to dame for months," someone else tweeted.
"Heat were the definition of tampering during the Dame sweepstakes lmfao," another user posted.
Miami Heat miss chance of landing Damian Lillard and becoming favorites for the title
The Miami Heat were considered the favorite to land Damian Lillard after the latter's trade request on July 1st. Lillard had named the Heat as his preferred trade destination, but his request was never granted.
Talks between the Heat and Portland Trail Blazers stalled, as the Blazers didn't like what Miami was offering. As a result, the Heat missed the chance to land the All-Star guard and cementing themselves as the grand favorite for the championship.
They would become the No.1 team to claim the title as Lillard would pair with Jimmy Butler and Bam Adebayo to force a dominant Big Three. However, the Heat and Blazers never reached a deal, and Lillard got traded to the Bucks.
Lillard's agent, Aaron Goodwin, said regarding the Heat-Blazers trade talks, (via Anthony Chiang of the Miami Herald):
"They did everything they could to acquire Dame. It takes two to get a deal done. I appreciate all that Pat [Riley], Andy [Elisburg] and Micky [Arison] did to try and make this happen"
After the end of the Damian Lillard trade saga, Miami has reportedly shifted their attention to Jrue Holiday, who moved to Portland, but will be traded again soon, with the Heat among the candidates to land him.
