Potential Part-Time Point Guard Jimmy Butler Embracing Role as Bulls' New Leader

CHICAGO — For two weeks this summer, Doug McDermott flew out to San Diego to stay at Jimmy Butler’s house and work out. Butler was coming off a breakout season, for which he’d been handsomely rewarded. McDermott had struggled through a disappointing rookie season.

Both Chicago Bulls teammates were highly motivated to improve their games, but even McDermott was taken aback at Butler’s tenacity. “Jimmy would come in my room at 5 a.m.,” McDermott said. “My alarm was set for 5:15, and we'd get up and go." 

The venue was different, and so was the goal. But the relentlessness that has gotten Butler this far was still intact.

Last summer, intent on making a leap going into a contract year, Butler holed up in Houston with a few close friends and no cable or Internet. It paid off in a big way: Butler made his first NBA All-Star team, won the Most Improved Player award and signed a five-year, $94 million contract in July to stay in Chicago long-term.

This latest push wasn’t to earn a payday—he’d already done that. And now that he’s gotten his money, Butler is on a new mission: to prove that his career year wasn’t a fluke and that he’s a legitimate superstar in this league.

Nam Y. Huh/Associated Press

Part of that has been stepping into a role the Bulls didn’t even know they needed filled. This is a roster full of veteran talent that has always taken a lead-by-committee approach, rather than rallying around a central figure on the court. For all the talk about whose team it is, the soul of the Bulls has always been and remains Derrick Rose. The heart of the team is Joakim Noah. But they haven’t had a central voice. In years past, the closest thing to that was Tom Thibodeau—the polarizing head coach who kept the Bulls together and competitive through all manner of injuries and adversity.

But unless you’re Gregg Popovich’s Spurs, a team can only go so far when its dominant voice is its coach. In his first week of training camp in Chicago, new head coach Fred Hoiberg has drawn rave reviews from the players as a more laid-back, player-friendly coach than his predecessor. The flip side is the void of a strong, dominant personality that has been open since Thibodeau’s unceremonious departure. And that’s become Butler’s niche.

“I think Derrick’s the quiet one, and Jo’s the emotional one,” Butler said. “Somebody has to be that guy to be calm while still making sure we’re doing what we’re supposed to be doing at both ends of the floor.”

His teammates have fallen in line. The contract has changed everything for Butler in the way he carries himself. He’s no longer trying to prove that he even belongs in an NBA rotation. He’s paid like a superstar now, and he’s embracing the accountability that comes with that money and status.

“I knew Jimmy was good,” said Hoiberg. “But he’s been awesome. He’s so strong right now. He’s in great shape and another guy where the amount of work he put in in the summer is paying off. He’s probably in the best shape of anybody out here. He’s all over the floor, offensively and defensively. There aren’t a lot of two-way players in this league, but he’s definitely one of them.”

Butler made waves this summer by saying numerous times that he wants to play more point guard. Some took it as a shot at Rose, after some reports arose toward the end of last season of tension between the backcourt partners. Truthfully, it’s more a testament to Butler’s hunger for more responsibility and more expectations. And he’ll certainly get an opportunity to try it out early on in the preseason while Rose recovers from last week’s surgery to repair a fractured orbital bone. The team is optimistic he’ll be ready to play opening night.

Charles Rex Arbogast/Associated Press

“Why not?” Butler asked during camp. “I think [playing point guard] is another challenge, something I have to get better at anyway. The only way to get better at it is to go out and do it, attempt it. Trial by error, I guess. Hopefully I don’t mess up too much, but I have confidence that I can do whatever my team needs me to do.”

Hoiberg’s read-heavy offense has a lot more room for experimentation with positions and roles than Thibodeau’s more by-the-book approach did. Butler playing point guard won’t mean he’s stepping on Rose’s toes—just that there will be an opportunity for him to make more plays while Rose plays off the ball, which could benefit both players.

Hoiberg is open to the idea.

“There are different ways to make him a playmaker,” the coach said. “One way to get the ball down the floor is for him to rebound it, and then we have to fill the lanes. If he’s out there with Derrick, Derrick can be a lane-runner while Jimmy pushes it down the floor. But getting him in live ball-screen situations, whether it’s setting a back screen into a ball screen, anytime you get Jimmy with a live dribble into a ball screen, good things happen.”

It’s going to be a lot of trial and error early on, as the Bulls’ new coach feels out his players, and those players feel out their new roles. The Butler-at-point-guard experiment will play itself out over the course of the year, and the results are to be determined. But his new mantle as the team’s on-court leader and locker room focal point is already a success.

Sean Highkin covers the Chicago Bulls for Bleacher Report. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook.