Former NBA player makes ludicrous claim about Jimmy Butler, relative to Miami Heat

If you are a Miami Heat fan, no matter whose side you took, you likely hated how the Jimmy Butler era ended.

After Butler joined the Heat in 2019, the franchise rediscovered something close to prior glory, with Butler leading the way, with his elevated playoff play and his iconoclastic personality. He went toe-to-toe with LeBron James and the Los Angeles Lakers in the Bubble NBA Finals in Orlando in 2020, and carried the Heat to the NBA Finals against the Denver Nuggets in 2023, even while limited by a second round ankle sprain.

The relationship disintegrated when the Heat wanted Butler to take the regular season more seriously, and Butler wanted the Heat to extend his contract. Joy was lost, and never found. And after a series of suspensions that started roughly one year ago, he was traded last February to the Golden State Warriors for a package of players that led to Andrew Wiggins, Kasparas Jakucionis, Davion Mitchell and Norman Powell being part of the current Heat squad.

Even those who believed Butler was overly petulant on the way out shouldn't have taken any glee in what happened Monday night, as the Heat faced Butler and the Warriors in San Francisco, for what was their only encounter of this season (Butler rested rather than play in the Warriors's November 19 game in Miami).

Butler tried to gather a rebound while tangled with Mitchell, came down awkwardly, had his knee buckle, and lost the rest of his season. The diagnosis came Tuesday morning: a torn ACL.

Breaking: Golden State Warriors star Jimmy Butler has suffered a season-ending torn right ACL, sources tell ESPN. pic.twitter.com/WIbPQqubfJ
— Shams Charania (@ShamsCharania) January 20, 2026

When the bad news was released by ESPN that Butler would miss the rest of the season -- and perhaps longer -- you didn't see Heat fans celebrating on social media. Or saying that Butler got what he deserved in some sense because of the way he threw his supportive head coach Erik Spoelstra under the bus last season, and ignored his former teammates on his trips back to Kaseya Center.

Ah, but leave it to former NBA guard Nick Young to suggest something along those lines.

Nick Young believes Jimmy Butler ACL injury against his former team may be karma related 😬

“Against your old team too. Somebody not living right. Somebody not living right man. Go pray. That’s just karma. I don’t want nobody to get hurt but that don’t rarely happen against your… pic.twitter.com/lpTY9GHwpb
— Heat Central (@HeatCulture13) January 20, 2026

Young called the situation "just karma."

And not just that, as he appeared on the video podcast Gil's Arena, with Gilbert Arenas, who is accustomed to saying similarly outrageous things.

“Against your old team too. Somebody not living right. Somebody not living right man. Go pray. That’s just karma. I don’t want nobody to get hurt but that don’t rarely happen against your old team. Steve Kerr treating people bad over there. That’s tough man. I do wish him a speedy recovery but he ain’t gonna be speedy no more. That’s the last time he gonna be speedy.”
Nick Young, on Gil's Arena.

It's not clear what Young meant when it came to Kerr, the coach of the Warriors; what did Kerr have to do with Butler getting hurt on a random rebound?

As for the "speedy" part about Butler....

What was speedier was Young's exits from the playoffs during his own career.

Young appeared in 720 regular season games, but just 35 in the postseason, 20 of those in one postseason late in his career in which shot just 30 percent. He had two career playoff spots. While he's entitled to say what he wants, he doesn't have a leg to stand on when it comes to speaking down on Butler -- even if Butler is now on one reasonably healthy knee.