Every teammate will be devastated by the outcome of Jimmy Butler's devastating season-ending knee injury on Monday, but spare a thought mostly for the other veterans at the Golden State Warriors who may have just seen one of their final opportunities slip away.
At least for Stephen Curry and Draymond Green, their legacies at the franchise are cemented and won't change. However, for another veteran in Al Horford, Butler's injury is a cruel blow to justifying his decision to depart the Boston Celtics in free agency.
Jimmy Butler's injury is particularly unfair for Al Horford
After becoming a beloved member of the Celtics for seven of the past nine seasons, Horford chose to leave in part because of another disastrous injury. The 39-year-old saw Jayson Tatum go down with a torn achilles in last year's playoffs and clearly decided that Boston, without their best player, weren't going to be the kind of championship contender he wanted to be on at the final stage of his career.
That reasoning may have already been coming back to haunt him a little bit with the Celtics stunningly surging to the second-seed in the Eastern Conference, and with Tatum potentially to return before the playoffs roll around.
Now, Horford's free agency decision looks like a disaster, and not really through any fault of his own or the Warriors. He had to watch one of his long-time rivals -- turned teammate -- suffer an horrendous injury that essentially eliminates Golden State from having any type of puncher's chance in the playoffs, unless they can pull some kind of miraculous trade that seems highly unlikely.
There's also the aspect of Horford's own game that shouldn't be forgotten in this discussion. As much as Butler had an impact on the likes of Curry and Green, it was his ability to lead the second unit that was becoming arguably the Warriors' biggest strength.
After a rough start to his time with Golden State, Horford was becoming a huge piece in that too. Between himself, Butler, De'Anthony Melton and Brandin Podziemski, the Warriors were finally starting to thrive in the non-Curry minutes. How will the 5x All-Star now fare without Butler, particularly when those minutes could go to a younger, more unrefined player in Jonathan Kuminga?
It's a tough situation situation for everyone involved, but especially someone like Horford who chose to come and presumably finish his career playing next to Butler. Perhaps that changes now given he's got a player option in the offseason, and at the very least he's still got the 2024 championship already in his back pocket.