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Stephen Curry of the Golden State Warriors may have finally won a Finals MVP, but that does not mean that he escapes all scrutiny out there. Even with how transcendence he has been in changing how the game is played, there are still some out there that do not consider how he plays as top-tier superstar status
Mike James, a star in the Euroleague who had numerous cups of coffee in the NBA, was not too complimentary of the three-point all-time leader. A close friend of Kevin Durant, James recently went on the “Players Choice” podcast and talked about a recent debate he had with Durant about their top-five current NBA players.
He chose Durant, LeBron James, Joel Embiid, Giannis Antetokounmpo, and finishing it off by selecting Luka Doncic to round out his top-five. He provides an explanation to his controversial take on why he left Curry off his top-5 list.
“Steph, like how he plays and how he gets stuff off, it’s just kind of one-dimensional at times if that makes sense…he’s not the primary ball handler a lot, and for a point guard that kind of bothers me.”
The overseas guard further explained his reasoning pointing to how Steve Kerr’s system has maximized Curry’s play. He thinks the other five he picked could play at full potential in any other situation. Warrior fans will disagree with his take, but he’s entitled to his own opinion.
Mike James Has a History of Throwing Steph Curry Shade
Last summer, James bought up how Kyrie Irving should be amongst the most skilled players in the NBA. A commenter bought up that it was ridiculous that Irving would be considered over Curry, and James did not shy away and explained that outside of shooting, Irving is better than Curry in every other aspect skill-wise.
To make matters worse, after the exchange was aggregated on Instagram, Kevin Durant liked it, seemingly agreeing with what his good friend had to say.
It seems that Curry will never get as much respect as some people believe he should get from Mike James. It seems like the skill level between Irving and Curry can be argued, but to leave Curry off the top-five players at the moment is a bit ludicrous.
Steph Curry Views Big Three as ‘Package Deal’
James claimed that Curry was more of a system player, and it certainly does not help that narrative when the two-time MVP thinks of his collaboration with Draymond Green and Klay Thompson as a ‘package deal’ as reported by The Athletic on July 27.
Curry sees the Big Three as a package deal. While much of the talk of the season was about the Warriors’ plan to win-and-develop simultaneously, it isn’t lost on the veteran core how that plan disappeared in the postseason. It was all on them again, with the help of some critical vets.
It is hard to say if Curry’s offensive game would be different had he not played with Green and Thompson, but at the same time, Curry has shown he is very capable of playing with higher usage and creating shots for himself and others.
The narrative that Curry’s offensive flow thrives on the chemistry with his teammates is a myth as he has shown through the last couple of seasons that he can carry teams. Just look at bad the Warriors struggled going into the playoffs when Curry was out with an ankle sprain.
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