2018 NBA trade value rankings, Part 3: The top 20 assets in the league

2 of 18

Photo by Jordan Johnson/NBAE via Getty Images /

20. Jimmy Butler

Let’s step back into our alternate universe for a moment, shall we?

In this one, the Chicago Bulls got cold feet at the last minute and pulled out of the Jimmy Butler deal. As a result, Tom Thibodeau brings back essentially the same nucleus as last year, probably still signs Jeff Teague and Taj Gibson, and whatever rookie they ended up drafting would have gotten the same caring, nurturing treatment that Kris Dunn received last year.

That team is…probably fighting for a playoff spot? You’d bet on them making it if you got even odds, but you’d have to think about it for a second.

For all the potential that both Karl-Anthony Towns and Andrew Wiggins still hold, their on-court impact hasn’t caught up to their expected outcome. Before Towns started picking it up lately, they were called the worst defensive duo in the NBA.

True, the Minnesota Timberwolves’ offense has bludgeoned opponents into submission this year with the fifth-highest rate of isolation possessions in the league. Without Butler, that act becomes a tough one to pull off.

So yeah…Jimmy Butler has been pretty valuable to the Wolves. Is it that impossible to fathom a scenario in the next few years (assuming the Golden State Warriors eventually decide to let someone else play in the sandbox) where Minnesota could make a Finals run on Jimmy Buckets’ broad shoulders? Crazier things have happened.

It also isn’t hard to imagine a version of Butler – who is on his way to averaging at least 37 minutes a night for the fifth consecutive year, and who will be 30 years old when he plays the first game of his next contract, likely north of $200 million in total value – who is breaking down just as his young counterparts are hitting their strides.

At this point, the Wolves have made their bed and will lie in it for as long as they can. Still, it’s tough to forget the lack of a market that developed for Butler last summer, and wonder if everyone else was on to something that Minnesota will have to find out the hard way.