Iconic NBA photography by Nathaniel S. Butler showcased in new book

Most NBA fans, whether die-hard or casual, are familiar with the iconic portrait of Bill Russell, known as the league's "Lord of the Rings." It is a striking image that captures the essence of his greatness. Unforgettable? Absolutely.

What many folks will remember — Russell wearing 11 championship rings from his Boston Celtics’ 1957-69 dynastic run — isn’t actually in that photograph. Only seven rings adorn the 62-year-old Russell’s fingers in that 1996 photo, and even getting that many posed a problem the day Nathaniel S. Butler shot the image in New York as part of the “NBA at 50” commemoration.

“That was a crazy story because they didn’t get rings back in those days for every year they won the championship,” Butler said, talking about the upcoming hardbound collection of his life’s work, “COURTSIDE: 40 Years of NBA Photography” (Abrams Books).

“After you got a ring or two, they gave guys different gifts. I wanted to know, well, what did they get? … It was very hard to find what was truth and what was folklore. But they got cuff links one year,” Butler said. “Another year they got a watch. Somebody said — and you can’t separate truth from fiction at this point — that the Celtics had a deal one year with Zenith, so one year, guys got a Zenith TV. I was like, ‘Wait, what?! Hopefully they got more than that.’

“So for the Russell picture, we borrowed other players’ rings to signify all 11.”

But who’s counting, right? The winningest player in major North American team sports is featured prominently, along with most of the NBA’s other legendary players, in Butler’s handsome and hefty collection. It’s due out Sept. 24 and serves as both a swell gift idea and as a photographic archive of the league, all seen through the lenses of one of its premier photographers.

With forewords by NBA commissioner Adam Silver and Hall of Fame center Patrick Ewing, the book includes text by reporter Dave McMenamin and an afterword by film director Spike Lee. Most of all, it is crammed with some of the most famous, stunning and/or illuminating photos of pro basketball’s biggest stars and memorable moments. Many saw light as magazine covers. Others became posters tacked to kids’ bedroom walls or became trading cards.

More than 50 of the featured performers contribute commentary. As does Butler, providing a connection between the shot and the shooter — on the court or crouched down on the baseline, in his customary vantage point — in what for all concerned often is a make-or-miss league.

Butler, universally known throughout the NBA as “Nat,” recently spoke with NBA.com about the book, his four decades in the league and the back stories to some of the remarkable pictures.

Roots of this project

Don’t get it twisted, this book is not a retirement capper on the man’s career.

“People kept asking me, ‘When are you going to do it?’ But it always drives me that I’m never satisfied. I’m always looking for the next ‘best’ shot,” Butler said. “So I could never do a book because my best was yet to come. That was my thinking anyway.”

The lull brought by the COVID lockdowns in 2020, though, gave Butler an excuse and time. He was heading toward the round number of 40 years on this job.

“Then when I would talk to people, they’d say things like, ‘I didn’t know you took that shot.’ and ‘Oh, you took that shot?’ So it was a combination of things, to where putting together a ‘greatest hits’ album made some sense.”

Butler’s early influences

Butler grew up in Montauk, N.Y., on Long Island, playing basketball and buying his first camera at age 12. His hoops limitations and his passion for photography diverged during four years at St. John’s University. That’s when he fully embraced the craft.

“I grew up literally running to the mailbox each week to get Sports Illustrated, to look at the photos,” he said. “Frank Deford, Curry Kirkpatrick, all of those writers that they had, too. And then I worked at Sports Illustrated as an apprentice and learned so much from their literal masters. Crazy talented. And I was just so fortunate, the timing of that, to learn from those guys was priceless.”

When Butler began with the NBA, the league didn’t even have an official photo department. So he and Andrew Bernstein started one. David Stern, just down the hall from Butler’s first office, was about to become commissioner. Michael Jordan was up next, entering the league with the Draft class of 1984.

Technology, then and now

Butler and Bernstein — the former mostly on the East Coast, the latter out West — developed some of the innovative lighting techniques needed to capture the speed and artistry of NBA action. Over the same time frame, photography morphed from its history grounded in film to modern digital options.

The first half of Butler’s career, he worked almost exclusively in film. Since then, it’s been mostly pixels and gigabytes.

“I used to shoot a Knicks game, drop film off at the lab, go have a burger or a slice of pizza waiting two hours to get the film developed,” Butler said.

One of his favorite early photos was a shot of Magic Johnson’s “junior, junior sky hook” in Game 4 of the 1987 Finals against Boston.

“Back then I was shooting black-and-white NBA PR, because newspapers used all black-and-white photos in those days,” Butler said. “I would run to the hotel and stay up all night developing the film, hoping I got the picture.”

Butler turned his hotel bathrooms into makeshift darkrooms.

“Now at games, I hit the button and it goes to Secaucus [headquarters for NBA Entertainment]. We have a team of editors, and there are 80 million followers on NBA Instagram or wherever who get the pictures 40 seconds later.”

Players: passive subjects to eager participants

Getting players to comment on Butler’s photos or recall the specifics of a play or a session breathes life into the book’s pages. He and McMenamin worked for a season and a half gathering the reactions and quotes.

Among the comments:

Giannis Antetokounmpo: “I remember this one. … I had to take off from the free-throw line to protect myself because I thought [the defender] was going to hit me in the air. … This is the first time I’ve seen this angle of the picture — Nat takes cool pictures, man.”

Jason Kidd: “Ooh man, I was young. That’s pretty cool. It’s kind of out of focus [an effect used to suggest motion], kind of like my game. Blur. That’s an incredible photo.”

Stephon Marbury: “When I look at this image, I see the photographer, the man, the person when he captured the moment — he actually got on the ground and he was measuring the perfect angle to shoot at. He made it look like I was floating through the sky.”

Patrick Ewing: “It felt like every major moment of my career, I’d turn around and Nat would be there.”

Said Butler: “Tim Duncan was one of my favorite players. But I didn’t even attempt to talk to him. Y’know, it’s not his thing. I got a couple of quotes from Pop having to do with him, and that was huge for me.”

Capturing the NBA at 50 & 75

Butler wasn’t around for the league’s first four decades, but the celebrations in 1996-97 and 2021-22 allowed him to go retro. That got some of the game’s early legends into the book.

“I shot a portrait of Wilt Chamberlain at the famous Kutsher’s summer camp [in the Catskills]. I shot Willis Reed and the old Knicks. That was a thrill. And that’s when we did the Bill Russell with the rings,” he said.

“I recall Adam said, back when we did the NBA at 50 portraits, that the league was so fortunate, with all of its ‘Babe Ruths’ still with us. Then you fast-forward to Cleveland again 25 years later and even since then, a number of guys have passed away and it’s very humbling. of us can turn the clock back.”

Making the cuts

Readers with rooting interests invariably will notice that some of their favorites got more attention in the book than others. Antetokounmpo gets eight pages, Nikola Jokic five, Luka Doncic two. Vince Carter’s exploits are displayed across eight, as are Kyrie Irving’s and Ewing’s.

Much of that, as you might expect in a collection of photos, is exposure: Butler works most of the NBA regular season out of Madison Square Garden in New York and Barclays Center in Brooklyn. But the images, the moments, drove their selection for the book more than the performers.

May as well fan some flames here for endless barroom and Internet debates to note that the book features LeBron James on 14 pages and Michael Jordan on 12. On the court, in studios and in locker rooms.

“There was no rhyme or reason,” Butler said with a laugh. “It’s just that, those particular guys, I could have had 50 pages each.”

“Once LeBron went to the Lakers, I didn’t see him a whole lot. I did want to go to his game when he broke the [career points] record. We re-created the famous Wilt ‘100 points’ photo, and he was very amenable to doing that.

“There are a million Jordan images, but I also like to break it up — I didn’t want every shot to be a dunk. There’s one of him driving around Shaq and Shaq is towering over him, with Michael looking like he’s 5-6 instead of 6-6.”

Players’ league, people business

Butler has a lengthy list of acknowledgments in the book.

“We’ve been fortunate to see a lot of great moments, but you remember the people,” he said. “Coaches have been great when I’ve been in their locker rooms, being a fly on the wall.

“We’re all in the moment working very hard, players and all of us. Sometimes you need to take a step back. For me, a lot of times, it’s the guys near the end of their careers where they’re a little more vocal about [appreciating] the work. There’s a level of rapport and professionalism that you’ve built up over the years.”

Butler has knocked on doors at players’ homes for a scheduled shoot and, upon entering, seen many of his photographs on display.

“That’s always very humbling,” he said. “Everybody loves the handshake with Adam and back in the day David Stern when they first got drafted. And they all have encyclopedic memories of different [game] moments.”

One that got away …

While Butler has been a witness to NBA history, snapping his tales 1,000 words at a click, some tales have been told better than others. Timing, vantage point, shadows and some opposing player’s limbs or butt can make or break great photos.

“Honestly, at that time, it’s a little bit of luck,” he said. “You’re prepared for anything but a little luck never hurts. … It’s a live game. You don’t get any do-overs.”

When Jordan dribbled up court in Utah late in Game 6 of the 1998 Finals, for instance, he was headed straight toward Butler. Jordan faked out (pushed off?) the Jazz’s Bryon Russell and sank the jumper that won Chicago’s sixth championship and capped his Bulls career.

But the photo taken from the other baseline — with Butler visible and half-hidden behind his camera, to the right of Jeff Hornacek’s knee — is the one that became famous as “The Last Shot.” It is timeless, like a classic painting showing the faces of so many about-to-be heartbroken fans in Salt Lake City.

“That was my thing, I always wanted Michael coming toward me in the second half,” Butler said. “So I shot his winning shot but it’s not even close to being as cool as the one from the other end of the court, where you see people’s faces. They’re looking in awe, in the context of the moment.”

… And one that didn’t

Butler was at the far end of the floor in Miami in 2013 when Ray Allen hit his stunning corner 3-pointer in Game 6 against San Antonio to avoid defeat and spin the Heat toward the NBA title two nights later. It wasn’t a great location until it was, nailing arguably the most famous game-tying shot in league history (vying with Garfield Heard’s 20-footer to force triple-overtime in Game 5 of the 1976 Finals).

Said Butler: “I’m waiting to pan over to get [coach Gregg Popovich] hugging Tim Duncan, they’re putting the ropes up, and Ray hits that shot. OK, here we go!”

Playing favorites, and a sequel

Butler knew he couldn’t please everyone with the photos he selected for the book, so he made sure to mostly please himself.

“I grew up a Knicks fan, so I always liked the [John] Starks’ dunk or Patrick climbing up on the table and putting his arms up. I do like that Bill Russell rings picture, because of what a personality he was and how gracious he was.”

But one of his most striking visuals came just last June when he caught and perfectly framed the hysteria at TD Garden after Game 5 in Boston. Immediately after the clinching victory, Butler caught Jayson Tatum hoisting his son “Deuce,” perfectly framed against spray of confetti.

That one came too late. The publisher’s deadline for the book had passed.

A keeper for Volume II?

“I was joking with some friends who are Knicks fans and said, ‘My second one will be when the Knicks win the championship,’ ” Butler said. “There are a lot of photos that didn’t make the cut that are in a folder on my computer. So we’ll see how this one goes.”

Don’t forget, as Butler said, the next great shot still is out there.

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Steve Aschburner has written about the NBA since 1980. You can e-mail him here, find his archive here and follow him on X.

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