BUTLER’S BULLS
Wade makes it clear that this team will revolve around Jimmy
Jimmy Butler can’t hide from it anymore.
The two- time All- Star has spent the last few weeks downplaying the idea that the Bulls are his team now that Derrick Rose and Joakim Noah have changed addresses. He got frustrated with persistent questions about it Thursday.
“You’re not going to hype me up and put me into that one,” Butler said to one reporter.
Yet on Friday, he was put right back into that one, and nothing was going to get the spotlight off him.
That’s the star power of new Bulls guard Dwyane Wade, and it was on full display when the threetime NBA champion finally was in- troduced to the Chicago media.
Sure, Wade’s wife, Gabrielle Union, held up the start of the news conference with a little Hollywood tardiness. And, yes, Noah might call this new- look Bulls roster “Hollywood as hell the sequel.” But considering the front office has been waiting more than a decade to land a big- name free agent rather than a series of consolation prizes, a lot could be overlooked.
But what couldn’t be overlooked was Wade clearing the air on all this talk about whose team it was.
“I think it’s Jerry Reinsdorf ’s team,” Wade joked at first.
Then the Chicago native told an interesting story.
“It’s funny to be sitting in this seat,” Wade said. “I remember when Shaquille O’Neal came to Miami [ in 2004]. Coming from the Lakers, three championships, and we had no championships at the time. And I remember his press conference. I was playing in the Olympics at the time, like Jimmy is right now. I remember Shaq saying, ‘ We’re not going to go through this all year.’ He said, ‘ It’s Dwyane Wade’s team.’
“We’re not going to go through this all year. It’s Jimmy Butler’s team. Myself and [ point guard Rajon] Rondo are here to bring what we bring as athletes to this team and to this city. [ Butler is] the young bull on this team. He’s a 26- year- old who can play 40 minutes if coach [ Fred Hoiberg] wants him to, and maybe more. I ain’t trying to do all that. And we’re going to depend on him a lot.” Wade then took it a step further, crediting the front office for the sell job it pitched to get him out of Miami after 13 seasons but giving a big portion of the credit to Butler. Butler was front and center in not only recruiting Wade and Rondo, but any bigname free agent who would listen, in addition to players who aren’t free agents until next season. “As much as Gar [ Forman] and John Paxson have done an amazing job making sure that this can happen, this wouldn’t have happened if it wasn’t for Jimmy Butler,” Wade said. “Jimmy called me and told me he wanted me here. That was huge because at the time I didn’t know.
“When you think about it, hometown kid Derrick Rose here, and he finally leaves. Noah, who is very known here, leaves. It’s now Jimmy’s team. So to want to bring in a guy like myself and Rondo, it shows what he’s about. He’s about winning.”
Which Wade said he was all about in making the move back home.
“This was a place I really wanted to be,” Wade said. “This was a place my heart really pulled me towards.”