NBA media is going to have a field day with this one. Marcus Thompson is the author of The Miraculous Rise of Steph Curry. He talks about the rise of Curry but in that rise the hate/jealousy that Curry gets from other superstar players. Namely, LeBron, CP3 and Westbrook.
It’s understandable that CP3 may not like him. The Clippers and Warriors had a budding rivalry and the Clips eliminated them in a 7 game series in 2014. Then, the Warriors had this sonic boom level rise and since then Curry has gotten the best CP3 in most of their matchups. Curry essentially leapfrogged over CP3 and then some.
Thompson spoke to Jason McIntyre of the Big Lead on his podcast and spoke about LeBron and Curry’s relationship because they were good once upon a time but now….
There’s a thing with he and LeBron that’s a little weird. There was a time when LeBron and Steph were big brother and little brother and LeBron was like a mentor.
He was a big fan of Steph, went to games at Davison, and even when [Curry] got to the NBA, they had moments where LeBron was looking at him like, ‘wow’ and then Steph kind of challenged LeBron’s status. The part that’s odd for Steph – why does that mean there has to be beef between us? He loves LeBron and respects LeBron, and he’s like, ‘because the outside world is pitting us together, why do you and I have to now have this disdain between us, I thought we were cool? … that’s the question that’s in Curry’s mind and Curry’s camp. Why do you not like me when all I did was basically respect everything you did, and follow the model you carried out? … it’s not just with LeBron … Steph wants to be accepted by all these guys.
There’s been a noticeable cooling off between LeBron and Curry. LeBron is the best player on the planet and has been for some time now but the praise that Curry got for his must have a little annoying and then the unanimous MVP vote was the cherry on top.
Steph does get plenty of love from the media. However, he did get it for not showing up in the finals especially being unanimous MVP. The noise of those critics might’ve been louder for LeBron or Westbrook but he played poorly and got called out for it. Even his wife was put on front street when she tweeted about the finals being “rigged”.
The adoration for Curry might certainly cause jealousy and hate. We see it all the time where you are loved and then hated for not winning soon enough, or not being “clutch” etc and then being loved or at least semi-loved again. We saw it with LeBron and we’re seeing it with Westbrook as he most likely will win MVP for his historic season.
At the end of the day the NBA is a brotherhood. You can’t control what’s said about you or how people perceive you. You just play the game and be as great as you can be, which all these athletes doing against each other.