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Let’s talk definitive best.
Steph’s splits over first 4 games of ‘16 Finals:
11, 6, 4
18, 9, 4
19, 1, 3
38, 6, 5
The man was not in tip-top shape but had one lights out game chucking from deep to put Dubs up 3-1 and then the weakest shit in history of the NBA happened...
Steph’s splits over first 4 games of ‘16 Finals:
11, 6, 4
18, 9, 4
19, 1, 3
38, 6, 5
The man was not in tip-top shape but had one lights out game chucking from deep to put Dubs up 3-1 and then the weakest shit in history of the NBA happened...
The *best* player of this era, his media go-to guys and the Cavs leadership repeatedly pressured the league front office to give them a fighting chance by removing the Warriors’ defensive anchor.
They wanted two games and they got one. But it ended up being a double bonus anyway because Bogut went down in Game 5. Bogut is a Gasol-like high IQ player, nothing flashy but he, along with Draymond, set the defensive tone for the Warriors.
Bogut getting injured is incidental, it’s a variable of the game you accept. Draymond getting suspended is not. There’s little that can be done about injuries that severely compromise a player, there should be discretion when on-the-court conflict doesn’t harm people or the game.
The Draymond and Lebron brouhaha was minor and inconsequential and for all the false memories that Dray punched his nuts, not once did Lebron respond as if his nuts were harmed. They literally contrived a nut shot after the game because Dray made light contact with his shorts.
What was true is that Lebron was losing fair and square with K-Love and Kyrie on the floor and that was far too much for his pride to stand and he did something that the best players ever just don’t do or at minimum, aren’t expected to do...
He didn’t graciously accept he was losing like an MJ getting swarmed by the Bad Boy Pistons, he didn’t grind his teeth like a Kobe and resolve to come back next year to off the Boston Big 3. No, he ascended the press scrum podium and petulantly cried for Silver to do something.
For all his freak athleticism and preternatural court vision, the man is also one of the greatest sore losers of all time. Whether it’s begging for administrative interference, passive-aggressively litigating every award he loses or showing up after sweeps in a soft cast...
...he is the Donald Trump of the NBA. If he can’t stack the deck, special favors are demanded. And if special favors can’t be done w/o plausible deniability, blame is meted out, and when blame is difficult to shift, he runs to another team like Trump abandoning a failed casino.
Back to Steph. Steph was arguably the best player across the 2014/15 and the 2015/16 seasons. Jason Timpf and other pretzel logic expositors will tell you it’s not definitive because he lost in 2016...
And of course Steph, a guy who exemplifies the spirit of competition, doesn’t make excuses for that result. But those willing to call a spade a spade, can fill in what the best are too firm in themselves to say...
The Donald Trump of the NBA pulled a “Russia if you’re listening...” and invited league collusion to dramatically improve his chances to win when he walked up to that podium after Game 4 and demanded off-the-court help, against an already weakened opponent.
The definitively best don’t do that. The definitively best don’t point at a mark and ask the league to remove their opponents from the field of play. That’s what threatened crime bosses do. It is a now an accepted extortion racket among his fans and cronies that he is this way.
The definitively best take their lumps and that’s what Steph has always done and continues to do even through back to back major injuries to his wing man. Hurrah hurrah for the league’s ‘14-‘16 definitive best and ‘14-19’s most impactful player. Mr. Zero Excuse Man: Steph Curry.
