The Warriors finally have a window on Jimmy Butler. ESPN’s Anthony Slater reported Friday that Butler could return somewhere between January and February, which is the first concrete target Golden State has attached to the injury.
It is also a long way from what anybody hoped in February, when he tore his right ACL.
The injury and the rehab
Butler, 37, tore the ACL on Jan. 19 in a game against Miami, the team that traded him to Golden State a year earlier. He had surgery in February.
He has progressed to individual court work. The next milestone, per the reporting, is landing comfortably after a game-speed jump. That is a meaningful marker and also a reminder of where he is: a 37-year-old who has not yet proven to his own medical staff that he can come down from a jump at full speed.
Several milestones remain after that one. No official return date has been announced, and this is a planning estimate rather than a medical clearance.
Kerr is framing it as an advantage, which is a choice
Steve Kerr’s version of the timeline is optimistic in a specific way.
“We get Jimmy back around February instead of losing him in February,” the Warriors coach said, arguing that the team can build momentum before Butler returns and then enter the playoffs with him integrated.
That is a reasonable thing for a coach to say in October. It also skips the part where Golden State has to be good enough through three and a half months to make the integration worth anything.
Butler himself has been less interested in the subject. “I know. We know. Y’all just find out whenever y’all find out,” he said of his timeline. He also offered a prediction about his return: “I bet whenever I step on the floor, they’re going to send more than one body.”
He earlier promised an eye-popping comeback and said he expects to be nicer when he returns, which, for Butler, is the funniest sentence available.
Golden State’s offseason assumed he would be back
The Warriors spent like a team planning a playoff run. Stephen Curry signed a two-year, $116 million extension in September. Brandin Podziemski got a five-year, $110 million extension in October.
Golden State has also been linked to star acquisitions throughout Butler’s absence, including a 2026 Giannis Antetokounmpo pursuit that Milwaukee declined before trading him to Miami.
Which leaves the Warriors where they have been for two years: a team built around a 38-year-old guard, paying significant money to a supporting cast, waiting on a 37-year-old forward’s knee.
They open against the Lakers. Butler will be watching, and on the current timeline he will keep watching for about a third of the season.
A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.