Butler Feeling Right at Home With Wizards
After Two Trades, Forward Set for Another Playoff Run
Caron Butler, who posted a career-high 17.6 points per game this season, helped put the Wizards in familiar position with a No. 5 seed for the playoffs.
(By Toni L. Sandys -- The Washington Post)
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Saturday, April 22, 2006
Washington Wizards Coach Eddie Jordan knew he had something special in Caron Butler on Nov. 2, when the Wizards opened the regular season with a 99-96 victory at Toronto.
Right after the tense win, which wasn't sealed until Raptors guard Jalen Rose missed a three-pointer at the buzzer, Butler burst into the locker room and yelled, "I haven't won in a month!"
The moment was telling for Jordan, particularly because Butler came off the bench that night, as he would for the season's first 22 games. Though he wasn't thrilled about being a sixth man after starting during his first three seasons with the Miami Heat and Los Angeles Lakers, Butler accepted his role without complaint and focused on helping his team win games.
That's not something Butler did much of with the Lakers last season. The team went 1-10 in the month of April, finished 34-48 and missed the playoffs.
"He was so happy to win after losing last season, he just yelled it out," Jordan recalled. "When I heard him say that, I said, 'I got him now, he'll do anything.' Caron is very coachable. He respects coaching authority and he accepts responsibility and I love coaching him."
Wizards fans are learning to love Butler just as much as Jordan, who made the 6-foot-7 forward a starter at Denver on Dec. 21 and has seen his team go 33-21 with Butler in the starting lineup.
When Butler's name was announced before last Sunday's crucial home game against the Cleveland Cavaliers, after he had missed five games with a sprained right thumb, the crowd of 18,405 erupted with a loud ovation.
After Butler scored 21 points with eight rebounds and four steals in leading the Wizards to a playoff-clinching win, forward Antawn Jamison said of Butler's impact: "We're whole again. We got our glue back."
With Butler healthy, the Wizards won their final three games and wrapped up the fifth seed in the Eastern Conference, setting up a first-round playoff series against the Cavaliers that starts today at Cleveland's Quicken Loans Arena.
If the Wizards win the series and spoil LeBron James's first postseason experience, Butler should be a major reason why. In his first season with the Wizards, Butler posted career highs in scoring (17.6 points per game), rebounding (6.2), assists (2.5) and steals (1.69) while emerging as a physical, playmaking presence on both ends of the floor.
After being traded twice, first from Miami to Los Angeles as part of the Shaquille O'Neal deal after the 2003-04 season and then from Los Angeles to Washington as part of the Kwame Brown deal last summer, Butler appears to finally have carved out an NBA home.
He signed a five-year, $46 million contract extension just before the start of the regular season and is a cornerstone of President of Basketball Operations Ernie Grunfeld's effort to build a consistent playoff contender.
