Jimmy Butler triple-double gives Heat life in NBA Finals with Game 3 win

Jimmy Butler was feeling good, feeling amped during a pre-game interview before Game 3 of the NBA Finals vs. the Los Angeles Lakers. With the Miami Heat trailing 2-0 and without Bam Adebayo and Goran Dragic again, Butler looked confident as ever. He went out and showed just why we call him Jimmy Buckets, leading the Heat to a huge victory to effectively save their season, posting a 40-11-13 triple-double in a 115-104 win on Sunday night.

It was the second straight game in which Butler played 45 minutes. He did the same thing in the loss in Game 2 and the Heat showed signs of life despite a 10-point loss. This was a game highlighted more by the Lakers’ struggles. L.A. started the game off with 14 turnovers at halftime. AD was in foul trouble. Both Anthony Davis and LeBron James were turning the ball over like crazy. Davis finished with 15 points and 5 rebounds, arguably his most underwhelming game of this postseason. Give credit to the Heat. They made AD uncomfortable all night after not being able to stop him through two games. That’s Erik Spoelstra for ya.

On the betting side, the Lakers entered this game as 9.5 point favorites and weren’t getting points on the live line until after halftime when the Heat went out to a 12-point lead. Even at halftime, the Heat were getting points and were +140 on the ML. If you had Miami on the ML pre-game or bet them early on, you definitely cleaned up. This should make things interesting heading into Game 4 on Tuesday. If the Heat can get one of Dragic or Bam back in the lineup with some momentum, we’ve definitely got ourselves a series, people!

In the $20 DK Showdown GPP, Butler had a MASSIVE night at Captain at $14,700. He posted a cool 124.88 DKFP! There was also a solo winner in the contest with a score of 298.12. The lineup featured LeBron, Duncan Robinson, Tyler Herro, Kelly Olynyk and Markieff Morris. Morris, Herro and Robinson all came in at sub-6% ownership.

I’ll end the night with this stat for all you LeBron GOAT truthers out there. We might as well make Jimmy or the Big Face Coffee brand the new NBA logo.