Jimmy Butler had a hell of a year and it’s only getting better.  He won the NBA’s Most Improved Player award and a max contract to go along with it.  The road to get there however wasn’t an easy one.  Butler had a very difficult past and that’s where he wants to keep it, in the past.

via Chicago Mag:

Even Butler was stunned. “Hell, it came out of nowhere for me, too,” he says. “I’m not going to sit here and tell you I knew I was going to average 20 points a game in the best league in the world. I had no idea. Tell you the truth, I’d never averaged 20 points a game since high school. I was just playing ball, trying to help the team. But when I look at it now, I’m like, Wow.”

Still, he loathes reliving the past—so much so that he has removed the rearview mirror on his car (yes, really) as a symbolic reminder to never look back. His coach at Marquette University, Buzz Williams, says Butler was so sensitive about his upbringing that he swore Williams to secrecy while playing for him. […] When I ask why he hates talking about the past so much, Butler shifts uncomfortably on the sectional in the grand San Diego house. “It’s because I don’t ever want that to define me,” he says. “I hated it whenever it came up because that’s all anybody ever wanted to talk about. Like, that hasn’t gotten me to where I am today. I’m a great basketball player because of my work. I’m a good basketball player because of the people I have around me. And if I continue to be stuck in the past, then I won’t get any better. I won’t change, I’ll get stuck as that kid. That’s not who I am. I’m so far ahead of that. I don’t hold grudges. I still talk to my family. My mom. My father. We love each other. That’s never going to change.”

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