All-Star guard Jimmy Butler says he had « very little to do with » a disparaging tweet from his trainer regarding Chicago Bulls general manager Gar Forman.
June 23 (UPI) — All-Star guard Jimmy Butler says he had « very little to do with » a disparaging tweet from his trainer regarding Chicago Bulls general manager Gar Forman.
Butler was traded Thursday during the 2017 NBA Draft from the Bulls to the Minnesota Timberwolves .
After news of the move broke, Travelle Gaines compared Forman to a drug dealer.
« 0-82. Worst culture in the league. I met drug dealers with better morals then their GM. He is a liar and everyone knows, » Gaines tweeted. He later deleted the tweet.
Butler and Gaines were both in France for fashion week when the trade went down. Gaines has a photo of himself with Butler as his Twitter profile photo.
« I completely disagree when someone takes a shot like that, » Bulls executive vice president John Paxson said, referring to the tweet, at a press conference. « It’s not right. It’s not professional. And he shouldn’t have done it. I’ve worked with Gar for a long time and it’s an unfair characterization. He has motivation. Maybe he is emotional, but we are in a position where we have to do what we feel is right. »
« If he’s unhappy, that’s on him, not on us. »
Butler called Gaines « my trainer, my guy » in an interview with the Chicago Sun-Times.
« I don’t control what he says, » Butler told the Sun-Times . « He’s his own person. We’ll talk about it [afterward] obviously, but I don’t control what he says on social media. That’s his. There’s no right in me to tell him what he can or cannot do.
» [His message] doesn’t say much about [my feelings] . That’s Travelle Gaines. He’s my trainer, my guy, and you can say what you want to say about it, but [that tweet] has very little to do with me to tell you the truth. Yes, I know what he said. Yes, I saw it, but that’s his take on it. I didn’t say that. I didn’t post anything like that. »
Butler also thanked the Bulls for picking him in the 2011 NBA Draft.
He wrote a goodbye ode to his fans on Friday.
Butler’s former Bulls teammate and fellow Marquette Golden Eagles alum Dwyane Wade was a bit less pointed in his displeasure about the trade.
« D. A. M. N haha. My Guy!!! #Morelife, » Wade wrote on social media as a caption for a photo of himself and Butler laughing.
Forman told the high road in an interview Friday following Butler’s departure.
« Jimmy gave us so much, to this organization to this team, » Forman told the Bulls website. « He was great in this community. Obviously he was a terrific, terrific player, and you hate to see him go, but it was obviously a move we felt we needed to make in order to kind of jumpstart where we’re at and give us direction as far as a rebuild is concerned. »
