Miami Heat Acquire Donovan Mitchell, Move Jimmy Butler In Potential Four-Team Trade

Anthony Pasciolla, Anthony Pasciolla | May 7, 2024

May 5, 2024; Cleveland, Ohio, USA; Cleveland Cavaliers guard Donovan Mitchell (45) reacts after a; Credit: Ken Blaze-USA TODAY Sports / Ken Blaze-USA TODAY Sports

The Miami Heat's offseason is just beginning, but little time was wasted before trade rumors started consuming the media.

Bleacher Report recently proposed a four-team offseason deal, which would shake up the Eastern Conference in a major way. The trade sees the Heat acquiring Donovan Mitchell via the Cleveland Cavaliers and Kyle Kuzma via the Washington Wizards while moving on from Jimmy Butler, Tyler Herro, and Nikola Jovic.

The rest of the trade details are as follows:

Cavaliers receive Herro and four first-round picks; Philadelphia 76ers acquire Butler; and the Wizards get Paul Reed, Ty Jerome, Jovic, and a first-round pick.

Heat team president Pat Riley shared that the team is uninterested in parting ways with Butler but later added, "There's a possibility that a lot of things are on the table." Not to mention, Riley described Herro as "fragile" during the same interview.

Pairing Mitchell and Kuzma with All-Star center Bam Adebayo is a more unique look, but not necessarily better. There's no debate the Cavaliers superstar is an ideal replacement for Butler due to being roughly seven years younger. However, the skill gap between Kuzma and Herro is not substantial. Both are proven scorers who flash All-Star potential while also having major inconsistencies on both ends of the floor.

The biggest winners of the hypothetical trade are the Sixers, who reunite Butler with Joel Embiid. The Heat forward adds a much-needed reliable third option alongside Embiid and Most Improved Player Tyrese Maxey. Philadelphia's front office made the poor decision of signing Tobias Harris over Butler in 2019 and would likely not make the same mistake twice.

"The likely path would be a six-month wait for the extend-and-trade restriction to lift so Mitchell can opt out and extend for four additional seasons, starting at a max of about $44.4 million (higher if a new broadcast deal pushes the salary cap up)," B/R's Eric Pincus wrote of why the Heat would agree to the trade. "Kuzma is a talented scorer who has shown he can play championship basketball with the Los Angeles Lakers (beating Miami in 2020). If lack of discipline (on offense and defense) was an issue in Washington, it wouldn't be with the stricter Heat culture."

If Riley is losing confidence in Butler, Adebayo, and Herro as the team's Big Three, this move could make sense to shake up the lineup.

Anthony Pasciolla works as a contributing writer to Inside the Heat. He can be reached at ampasciolla@gmail.com or follow him on Instagram @anthony.pasciolla.

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