The United States men’s basketball team will be playing for a gold medal on Saturday because of Steph Curry.
Sure, other great players helped the U.S. escape an upset by Serbia on Thursday, but no one was greater than the Golden State Warriors star, who scored 36 points in a performance that is being rightly heralded as one of finest individual performances in Team USA history. (If it’s not the finest.)
For Curry, an Olympic gold medal, his first, would augment an already peerless career resume. (The U.S. opened as a 13.5-point favorite over France.)
And, sadly, this tournament could also prove the final moment of big-stage greatness for Curry.
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The Warriors, ostensibly, made two attempts to provide Curry, 36, with a clear-cut No. 2 — someone who can carry the offensive load on nights Curry was off or in moments Curry was resting — this offseason. The Dubs tried to make a mega-trade for then-Clippers star Paul George. They failed. (Get this, the Clippers didn’t want to help the Warriors.)
Then, this week, the Warriors’ efforts to trade for Utah All-Star Lauri Markkanen were rebuffed when the forward signed a contract extension with the Jazz.
Though how serious were those efforts? The Warriors refused to put either of the team’s two most valuable trade pieces — Jonathan Kuminga and Brandon Podziemski — in the deal.
You can’t get something without giving up something.
Curry is a one-franchise player — a rarity in the modern world of sports. He values what he, more than anyone else with the Warriors, has built throughout his 15-year NBA career — four titles, but also a new arena, global cultural cache, and a mountain of cash in the form of an astronomical franchise valuation increase.
Curry has been handsomely paid by the Warriors — there’s no doubt about that. But he can never truly be repaid for what he has brought the organization.
And this team they have built around him for the 2024-25 season does not honor the player he has been for this organization and, frankly, the player he still is.
The Dubs needed to augment the roster this offseason to give Curry another shot — even a small one — at a fifth title.
Does Curry’s legacy need another title? Of course not. The greatest shooter of all time is a back-to-back MVP, a Finals MVP, soon (hopefully) a gold medalist, and inarguably one of the greatest champions of the modern age.
But doesn’t he deserve another shot at one?
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Instead of providing him that opportunity, the Warriors have delivered Curry, the man responsible for the team going across the bridge, a bridge year.
(Yes, I found another way of saying “two timelines.”)
Sure, there are new games and numbers to learn for the team blue and yellow, but don’t confuse the Warriors’ front office’s activity the last few months with progress. The Dubs have not made significant enough gains (if any at all) to expect to graduate from the play-in tournament morass they couldn’t escape last season.
A true No. 2 could have done that. And one isn’t coming anytime soon.
Instead, the Warriors are going to see what they have with Kuminga and Podziemski, who will both be 22 this upcoming season.
No one can ever replace Curry, but the Warriors are, in effect, asking him to train two candidates to replace him as the face of the franchise.
LeBron James has been the USA’s best player this tournament. (He’s playing for our country now, so we can be honest — this guy is unbelievable.) At age 39 and playing for a Lakers team that will not be a title contender anytime soon, it’s undeniable that this is something like a swan song for the ageless wonder. He’s admitted as much in his comments in Paris — these might be his final truly important games.
With the current state of the Warriors, it seems that might be the case for Curry, too, even though the guard would never publicly admit such a thing.
But at least the Lakers, in a shocking bit of self-awareness, installed LeBron’s buddy as head coach and drafted his son, who averaged 4.8 points per game as a freshman at USC. Hey, we can’t help you win, so you might as well have a good time. Those perks have value.
And LeBron has only won one title for the Lakers, and that was in the COVID bubble of 2020.
What perk is Curry receiving from the Dubs for sacrificing at least one year of still-great play? The Warriors didn’t just spin their wheels this offseason, they also let his Splash Brother, Klay Thompson, walk out the door this summer, denying the team’s Big Three, a collective ride into the proverbial sunset.
That’s why, as enjoyable as it was to watch Curry go thermonuclear on Thursday — willing his team to a win with the world watching, just like he did in Game 7 against the Kings two years ago and certainly in Game 4 against the Celtics in the 2022 NBA Finals (if only to name the last two occurrences), the moment didn’t strike me as strictly celebratory, but also a bit tragic, too.
Curry is still one of the world’s best. Yet back home, he’s not receiving the gold-medal treatment he deserves.
