Major League Baseball's list of such specialists through the years includes Mariano Rivera, Dennis Eckersley, Bruce Sutter, Rollie Fingers and Goose Gossage, among the many.
In another sport and another time, a Timberwolves team that lost double-digit leads 22 times last season acquired three-time All-Star Jimmy Butler, who with toughness both mental and physical is establishing himself as one of his game's best closers.
A compilation of all his clutch shots late in games runs nearly six minutes on one YouTube channel. The Wolves themselves knew early about a guy willing to take the crucial shot _ and make it more often than miss _ or sacrifice his body getting to the free-throw line when it matters most.
Butler was the Chicago Bull who taught new teammate Andrew Wiggins a rookie lesson in his third pro game. That's when Butler slipped with the ball as the final seconds ticked away and still managed to fake Wiggins in the air, create contact and draw a foul that became two winning free throws with 0.2 seconds left at Target Center in November 2014.
Wiggins won't soon forget a moment that Butler doesn't remember.
"I've played so many games," Butler said. "My memory is bad."
But his will and timing have proved resolute for an All-NBA third-team selection last season who plays the piano, dominoes, billiards, checkers, even Connect 4 and fancies himself an NFL or Olympic track star off the court and is unwavering at both ends on it.
By Timberwolves coach and president of basketball operations Tom Thibodeau's season analysis, the ways his team lost leads and games last season ran "the gamut" from second quarters surrendered by an overmatched bench to his starting five's lousy third quarters and misguided late-game situations. Through it all, their defense and rebounding too often failed them when they needed it to be their bedrock.
"A lot of what we were doing wasn't tough enough," Thibodeau said. "We wanted change."
Enter Butler, who leads a charge of newcomers that also includes point guard Jeff Teague, former Bulls teammates Taj Gibson and Aaron Brooks and 18-year veteran Jamal Crawford.
Butler gives Thibodeau a star he knows well from their Chicago days together, and he gives the Wolves one of the league's best two-way players who while with the Bulls earned from team TV announcer Stacey King the nickname "Jimmy G. Buckets."
The G, of course, stands for "Gets."
