Nikola Jovic got a front-row seat to Jimmy Butler’s brand of basketball brutality, and the story he told on the 6.75range podcast makes one thing clear: practice with Butler was not for the faint of heart.
Jovic said the Heat were in Bahamas training camp when the team was trying to sort out whose group it was - Butler’s or Bam Adebayo’s. What followed was a run of one-on-one games involving Bam, Butler, Jovic, and Jaime Jaquez Jr., and the scoreboard, as Jovic remembered it, was lopsided beyond belief.
“Take the training camp, for instance-back when the question was whose team it would be, his or Bam’s,” Jovic said. “It was the training camp in the Bahamas.
The Bahamas training camp, that’s right. We were playing one-on-one: Bam, Jimmy, myself, and Jaime Jaquez.
I think the count was… I had one win, Jaime had two, Bam had five, and I believe Jimmy had 28. I mean, you wouldn’t believe it.”
For anyone wondering whether there was ever real doubt inside the building about who set the tone in Miami, that kind of number tells the story pretty fast. And even with that practice tale in hand, Jovic still pointed to another Butler moment that may be even more ridiculous: the famous 2018 session when Butler beat the Minnesota Timberwolves’ starters with third-stringers beside him.
Jovic said Butler’s edge came from the work, not some flashy bag of tricks.
“It’s not that he’s exceptionally talented or creative in the traditional sense, but the way he works, that work ethic he possesses is incredible,” Jovic said. “For example, the guy doesn’t even dribble with his left hand.
I tell everyone this: when he scored 56 points against Milwaukee in the playoffs-you know, when he hit that final three-pointer…He was dribbling from the left side with his right hand and went into a step-back with his right hand. It was just… it was unbelievable.
“He’s an incredible basketball player overall,” Jovic added. “That’s why he’s so good and such a fierce competitor.”
That Milwaukee performance came in the first round of the 2023 playoffs, when the No. 8 seed Heat knocked off the No. 1 seed Bucks in five games. Butler was the engine of it all, putting up 37.6 points, 6.0 rebounds, 4.8 assists, 1.8 steals, and 0.4 blocks per game, including 56 points in Game 4.
Jovic admitted he didn’t exactly circle that series as a Miami win. In fact, he had already made plans to leave.
“We were the eighth seed,” Jovic said. “By that point, I’d had enough of America, you know?
It was my first year not playing, right? So I thought, let me just go home-go back for a bit, first time back from the NBA, you know, see friends, hang out.
Anyway, after we beat Chicago, I got home, opened up my phone, and went on Booking.com… I said they will beat us four zeros, I’m going home right away.
“Who wants to wait?” Jovic continued.
“There’s no way we’ll get them. I booked everything… And we beat them.
Before the first game, you know, [Erik] Spoelstra come in the locker room, and he says ‘Whoever doesn’t believe that we’re going to win, leave the locker room right away.’ You know, the classic, classic motivation, you know that too.
“I’m sitting next to Jimmy, and suddenly-I ask him something, and he goes, ‘We’re winning this,'” Jovic added. “I’m like, ‘How are we winning this?’
He tells me, ‘There’s no one to guard me.’ And I’m thinking, Okay, sure, whatever.
First off, the guy is crazy.”
Miami’s run didn’t stop there. The Heat went on to beat the New York Knicks and the Boston Celtics before reaching the NBA Finals, where Butler was dealing with an ankle injury and wasn’t quite the same force against the Denver Nuggets. Denver won that series in five games for the first title in franchise history.
That was Butler’s second Finals loss with the Heat, after Miami fell to the Los Angeles Lakers in six games in 2020. Still, reaching the Finals twice in four years was no small thing, and the Heat looked like a team that could keep chasing that level with Butler in place.
Instead, things unraveled later. Butler had a falling out with the Heat in 2024 and was traded to the Golden State Warriors in 2025. Miami has since turned a corner by acquiring Giannis Antetokounmpo, and he’ll now try to do what Butler never could in South Florida: bring a championship to Miami.
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