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Speaker 1: Welcome to Hoops Tonight, presented by FanDuel here at the volume.
Speaker 1: Happy Monday, everybody. I hope all of you guys had
Speaker 1: a great weekend. Part in the different setup. I'm doing
Speaker 1: some renovations to the studio right now, so for about
Speaker 1: the next week or so, this will be the setup
Speaker 1: just want to get some permanent stuff in there. Had
Speaker 1: we threw the set together really fast. If you guys
Speaker 1: remember we started this show in February in the middle
Speaker 1: of the season, and so we didn't have a ton
Speaker 1: of time to get detailed with the setup. So we're
Speaker 1: doing some work in there right now. Um, that should
Speaker 1: be back to normal by next week. Season is right
Speaker 1: around the corner to we are, if I'm not mistaken.
Speaker 1: Four weeks from Thursday is the first preseason game this year.
Speaker 1: That's how close we are. And the next month we're
Speaker 1: gonna be spending a lot of time looking forward. We're
Speaker 1: gonna do another series, a detailed series similar to what
Speaker 1: we did with our top twenty five NBA players. We're
Speaker 1: gonna do the top fifteen power rankings going into the season,
Speaker 1: and each video is going to be a deep dive
Speaker 1: into everything about that particular team in the Power rankings,
Speaker 1: changes they've made to the roster over the offseason, what
Speaker 1: I expect them to look like on the offensive end
Speaker 1: of the floor and the defensive end of the floor,
Speaker 1: Predictions for the season, everything under the sun for each
Speaker 1: of the top fifteen teams in the league. That's something
Speaker 1: I'm really looking forward to But before we look forward,
Speaker 1: there is one last thing that we have to do
Speaker 1: looking backwards, and it's something I feel like it's really
Speaker 1: important because one of the best basketball players of all time,
Speaker 1: a player that coming into last season had three championships,
Speaker 1: should have had a Finals MVP, had one back to
Speaker 1: back m vps at one point, and is the foundational
Speaker 1: piece for one of the wildest franchise turnarounds in the
Speaker 1: history of the NBA and the most dominant franchise of
Speaker 1: this era. Mr Steph Curry. He just had not only
Speaker 1: another championship added to his resume, a Finals m v
Speaker 1: P what should have been a second added to his resume,
Speaker 1: but had one of the most dominant playoff runs of
Speaker 1: his career and an NBA history that changes a lot
Speaker 1: of things, that puts him into conversations with players that
Speaker 1: we never really thought that he'd be mentioned with when
Speaker 1: he came into the league. And so before we look forward,
Speaker 1: before we start thinking about this next season, I wanted
Speaker 1: to take an opportunity to think a little bit harder
Speaker 1: about where Staph lands all time. After this crowning achievement
Speaker 1: of his career, this playoff run, winning a fourth title,
Speaker 1: with the Golden State Warriors. So we're gonna be diving
Speaker 1: into where he ranks in the list to a um,
Speaker 1: how I what rules I use with my particular list,
Speaker 1: and get into some of the other players on the
Speaker 1: list as well. But it's gonna be a big focus
Speaker 1: on Steph. You guys know the drill before we get started.
Speaker 1: Subscribe to the volume's YouTube channel so you don't miss
Speaker 1: any more of our videos. Follow me on Twitter at
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Speaker 1: And then, last but not least, if you miss one
Speaker 1: of these videos and you can't get back over to
Speaker 1: YouTube to finish them, don't forget that you can always
Speaker 1: go to our podcast feeds wherever you get your podcasts
Speaker 1: and find the audio version of these shows under Hoops Tonight.
Speaker 1: So again, we need to have this conversation because I
Speaker 1: do think these things matter. Um, the debates themselves can
Speaker 1: get frustrating to me for the same reasons why the
Speaker 1: player rankings can get frustrating. Sometimes no one really wants
Speaker 1: to negotiate and good or talk or discuss and good faith.
Speaker 1: Everyone's kind of married to their opinions and it can
Speaker 1: get very like aggressive with people, and it doesn't end
Speaker 1: up being a basketball discussion often enough for my likeing.
Speaker 1: But I do think these things matter. The reality is is,
Speaker 1: particularly with the NBA, we care about player rankings. We
Speaker 1: talk about the goat the greatest of all time in
Speaker 1: basketball a hell of a lot more than we do
Speaker 1: with Major League Baseball or with football, obviously because of
Speaker 1: positional differences. And I think that's interesting because there are
Speaker 1: positional differences in basketball. I keep separate lists for bigs
Speaker 1: and perimeter players, which we'll talk about here in a minute,
Speaker 1: but lists, these all time rankings do matter a lot
Speaker 1: more within the historical context of the NBA than they
Speaker 1: do with other sports. And Steph Curry just had an
Speaker 1: incredible career defining achievement and as a four time champion,
Speaker 1: two time m v P, he is on a very
Speaker 1: short list of players who have hit those specific markers
Speaker 1: in NBA history, and so he's starting to force his
Speaker 1: way into some really complicated conversations, and that's recognition that
Speaker 1: he deserves. I've always been a big believer that you
Speaker 1: know that that that the trophy really means something, and
Speaker 1: when you have a season like this that ends in
Speaker 1: an achievement like Steph lighting up that Celtics defense and
Speaker 1: getting a trophy. I believe you deserve a hell of
Speaker 1: a lot of recognition because of just how hard that
Speaker 1: is to do. I do the same thing when Janice
Speaker 1: got the trophy last year, did the same thing when
Speaker 1: Lebron got it in again. When these guys add that
Speaker 1: particular achievement to their to their resume and needs to
Speaker 1: be celebrated. So a couple of things. First of all,
Speaker 1: why do I keep biggs and perimeter players in separate lists.
Speaker 1: It's the same reason why I value perimeter players more
Speaker 1: than bigs in general. But it goes deeper than that.
Speaker 1: They because I don't have to get into the basketball reasons.
Speaker 1: The main thing to me is it's they're just different positions.
Speaker 1: How can I possibly compare what Kareem abdul Jabbar did
Speaker 1: for the Lakers for all those years to what Steph
Speaker 1: Curry is doing for the Warriors. There's no basketball translatability.
Speaker 1: They didn't even do any of the same jobs on
Speaker 1: the floor, aside from the end result, which was putting
Speaker 1: the ball in the basket or stopping the other team
Speaker 1: from putting the ball in the basket. That's where the
Speaker 1: similarities end. So how can I say one player is
Speaker 1: better than the other when it's like comparing a left
Speaker 1: tackle to a cornerback in the NFL? Like it just
Speaker 1: there's not enough parallels there for me to make those
Speaker 1: types of comparisons. So for me, I'm gonna put perimeter
Speaker 1: players in one list, and bigs at any kind of
Speaker 1: big and another list that involves big centers like Kareem
Speaker 1: abdul Jabbar and Wilt Chamberlain and the best power forwards
Speaker 1: of all time, the Tim Duncans and the Dirk Namitzki's
Speaker 1: of the world. I view that specific position, the low
Speaker 1: post anchor on both ends of the floor, as a
Speaker 1: completely different position, a completely different job, but basically a
Speaker 1: different sport than what the perimeter players are asked to
Speaker 1: do on any given possessions. So I'm going to keep
Speaker 1: them in different lists. That's just the way I do it.
Speaker 1: A lot of people are going to do it differently,
Speaker 1: and that's fair, you know. Like some people say Kareem
Speaker 1: Abdulgibar is the greatest basketball player of all time, They're
Speaker 1: not wrong. I just have a hard time saying Kareem
Speaker 1: is better than Lebron and MJ considering they do absolutely
Speaker 1: nothing similar on a basketball court. And then lastly, I
Speaker 1: don't factor in any basketball before the nineteen eighties. The
Speaker 1: reason there is very simple. I have watched a lot
Speaker 1: of film from everything that's happened, from all of the
Speaker 1: greatest games in NBA history many times over. There's plenty
Speaker 1: of footage and a lot to dive in there to
Speaker 1: learn beyond it gets really cloudy for me, and I
Speaker 1: personally just don't feel comfortable having strong opinions about basketball
Speaker 1: players that played that long ago. The game looks very different.
Speaker 1: It's a lot harder to find footage. In general. It's
Speaker 1: just an era that I do not know enough about
Speaker 1: beyond what I've read in books and a little bit
Speaker 1: of footage that I've seen. So for me personally, I
Speaker 1: don't feel comfortable comfortable for that. There are a lot
Speaker 1: of guys out there that are older, that have been
Speaker 1: around the game a lot longer, that are more willing
Speaker 1: to dive into those types of comparisons. That's not me.
Speaker 1: So this particular list for me is perimeter players. After
Speaker 1: those are my rules. That's just the way that I
Speaker 1: do it. That's the way this list is gonna go.
Speaker 1: So what I want to do is I want to
Speaker 1: first list off what my top nine is without Steph
Speaker 1: and then what I what we'll do is we'll go
Speaker 1: over steps resume and where he fits into this list.
Speaker 1: So I have Michael Jordan at number one. What he
Speaker 1: did in terms of dominance, not just as an individual
Speaker 1: but with his team is unmatched in NBA history, and
Speaker 1: I think that that has to way more than everything
Speaker 1: else that we talked about on this list. When you
Speaker 1: win six championships in eight tries as a team, when
Speaker 1: it's considered blasphemous to even mention another player in the
Speaker 1: same breath as you, that is a type of dominance
Speaker 1: that nobody in this era has accomplished. There was maybe
Speaker 1: you two or three year stretch in the early two
Speaker 1: thousand tens, like from two thousand twelve to two thousand thirteen,
Speaker 1: in those two seasons where it was blasphemous to mention
Speaker 1: a name with Lebron James. But that was two years,
Speaker 1: and what mj did during that entire decade of the
Speaker 1: nineties mimics what Lebron did during that two year span.
Speaker 1: There's no comparison. And then in terms of team success.
Speaker 1: We've had players have three peats. We've had players win
Speaker 1: a lot of championships over a long period of time, too.
Speaker 1: To three peats executed within an eight year window is
Speaker 1: a level of dominance that no player in modern NBA
Speaker 1: history has been able to touch. I think we have
Speaker 1: to apply the appropriate amount of credit and attention in
Speaker 1: that direction, and that to me is gonna put MJ
Speaker 1: at number one on my list. Number two, I have Lebron.
Speaker 1: He's the unprecedented combination of longevity and greatness. There are
Speaker 1: players like uh like Karl Malone and and Kareem abdul
Speaker 1: Jabar that were around forever and we're very good the
Speaker 1: whole time. But for both of those guys, once they
Speaker 1: got over that age at thirty five, they were great players,
Speaker 1: but they were never considered potentially among the best players
Speaker 1: in the league. And that's the wild thing about the
Speaker 1: Lebron James experience. Like I, most Lebron fans disagree with me,
Speaker 1: and I have him at number four going into this
Speaker 1: age thirty eight season, this twentieth season of his career.
Speaker 1: It's a type of dominance at that age that we've
Speaker 1: never seen before. The other big thing with Lebron that
Speaker 1: I think often gets glossed over is there is no
Speaker 1: player in NBA history that has the variety of success
Speaker 1: that Lebron James has. From taking Eric Snow and Danielle
Speaker 1: Marshall and Drew Good into the NBA Finals in two
Speaker 1: thousand seven to winning sixty games twice and making it
Speaker 1: to the Conference finals with Moe Williams as his best
Speaker 1: teammate in that team with Delonte West and Shaquille O'Neil
Speaker 1: on it, but when he was way past his prime,
Speaker 1: to what he did with the Miami Heat, to the
Speaker 1: end of the Miami Heat era when Bosch was at
Speaker 1: the five and Dwyane Wade had declined quite a bit,
Speaker 1: to the Kyrie Irving Kevin Love Calves, to just the
Speaker 1: Kevin Love Calves going all the way to the NBA Finals,
Speaker 1: to having a winning record with Brandon Ingram and Crew
Speaker 1: when he was playing in two thousand nineteen, to what
Speaker 1: he did with Anthony Davis, like there's just regardless of circumstance,
Speaker 1: there is no player that has been as successful as
Speaker 1: he's been and as many different types of situations to
Speaker 1: solidify his basketball impact. With so many other players in
Speaker 1: NBA history. You can quickly point to like, oh, like
Speaker 1: he won this way, but who knows if he could
Speaker 1: have won if something else was different, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean? And even with MJ, it's like he always
Speaker 1: won because he had Scottie Pippen. And you know whether
Speaker 1: it was Horace Grant the first time around or is
Speaker 1: Dennis Rodman the second time around. He had a great
Speaker 1: front court that helped him do with do the dirty work.
Speaker 1: You never saw him win in like different styles, not
Speaker 1: undercutting what he did. That's just MJ. Or that's just
Speaker 1: Lebron's case, Lebron's pace. If you're attempting to say or
Speaker 1: convince people that he was better than m J, you're
Speaker 1: centering it around longevity and variety. He won over a
Speaker 1: longer period of time, and he won a bunch of
Speaker 1: different ways, and that is what kind of that kind
Speaker 1: of removes question marks and remove subjectivity from his basketball impact.
Speaker 1: At number three, I have Kobe Bryant, and I know
Speaker 1: that's gonna seem high for a lot of you guys,
Speaker 1: but I value what he did on the court a
Speaker 1: great deal. Also, I think the analytics movement did a
Speaker 1: lot to damage Kobe's legacy in a way that I
Speaker 1: don't think it's fair. You know, Kobe was inefficient as
Speaker 1: a score compared to a lot of his peers, but
Speaker 1: that had a lot more to do with the way
Speaker 1: the game was played in that era, slow pace, very
Speaker 1: little space to operate, still had bruising power forwards on
Speaker 1: the floor, two big lineups almost exclusively. I mean, he
Speaker 1: was playing with bidenm and Gasol. You know, that's just
Speaker 1: parameters shifting from era to era. It's not fair to
Speaker 1: compare James har it In and the types of shots
Speaker 1: that he's taking in this era with the type of
Speaker 1: spacing that he has to what Kobe was dealing with.
Speaker 1: And yet the analytics movement has driven that argument to
Speaker 1: the point where a lot of people have Kobe down
Speaker 1: at like thirteen all time in their rankings, which I
Speaker 1: just think is absurd and disrespectful. And I don't think
Speaker 1: there's a single thing that James Harden can do with
Speaker 1: the basketball as well as Kobe can do it, and
Speaker 1: he shot higher percentages. So what do you guys think
Speaker 1: that is? Do you think James Harden actually was better
Speaker 1: than Kobe at those things or do you think the
Speaker 1: parameters have shifted? I think the parameters have shifted, so
Speaker 1: I think it's Kobe has been unfairly maligned on that front.
Speaker 1: He's got a lesser version of MJ's career. He's the
Speaker 1: second best score of all time. He won five championships.
Speaker 1: His last two championships with the Lakers have become underrated
Speaker 1: as well. I mean, it really was just a bunch
Speaker 1: of role players in pau Gasol. Very good teams, but
Speaker 1: not the super talent related teams that we've seen when
Speaker 1: throughout NBA history. So I've Kobe at number three. Number four,
Speaker 1: I have Magic Johnson. I think he's the ultimate franchise
Speaker 1: foundational piece. We talked about this a lot with Tim
Speaker 1: Duncan and Steph Curry, this idea of the player that
Speaker 1: never really was like consistently the best player in the league,
Speaker 1: but that was always in that conversation, and their career
Speaker 1: spans multiple iterations of that team. The team is always
Speaker 1: winning and they win a lot of championships. That's magic,
Speaker 1: Tim Duncan and Steph Curry. I think Magic has the
Speaker 1: best version of that career. So I have him up
Speaker 1: at number four. The big thing with him his versatility
Speaker 1: as a big forward with as as much skill as
Speaker 1: he had allowed him to evolve his role as the
Speaker 1: team needed it to change. No different than him starting
Speaker 1: at center in an NBA Finals game in his rookie year.
Speaker 1: UM Number five, I've Larry Bird, three time champ, three
Speaker 1: time m v P. Team success is what keeps him
Speaker 1: behind Magic at this point. Those four so Lebron, Magic, Bird,
Speaker 1: and MJ All those, all of the five, not counting Kobe,
Speaker 1: those are the only four per emitter players to have
Speaker 1: three m vps and three titles. That's how rare that is.
Speaker 1: There were two bigs who did a Kareem and Russell
Speaker 1: that only six players in NBA history have three titles
Speaker 1: and three m vps. Not a coincidence that I have
Speaker 1: them as four of my top five going into this
Speaker 1: particular conversation. Number six, I have Kevin Durant, two times champion,
Speaker 1: one time m v P. I also have him as
Speaker 1: the third best score of all time. Number seven. Remember
Speaker 1: these are all players in their accomplishments. Post number seven,
Speaker 1: I have Dwyane Wade, a three time chap, one time
Speaker 1: Finals MVP. He had one of the most dominant playoff
Speaker 1: runs of all time in two thousand and six. He
Speaker 1: average twenty eight, six and six on fifty nine percent
Speaker 1: true shooting. In the finals, he averaged thirty five, eight
Speaker 1: and four on fifty seven percent true shooting. Uh Like.
Speaker 1: At his peak, he was arguably the most unguardable player
Speaker 1: in the NBA, with how difficult it was to keep
Speaker 1: him out of the lane. Number eight, which is wild.
Speaker 1: I already have Johannas antennakompa two time m VP in
Speaker 1: one time champ, already incredibly dominant playoff run in two
Speaker 1: thousand twenty one, probably should have won last year's MVP two.
Speaker 1: He's gonna be rocketing up this list at a high
Speaker 1: rate of speed. And then number nine, the final player
Speaker 1: in the top ten, not counting step I have Julius Irving.
Speaker 1: He won a title and an m v P in
Speaker 1: the early eighties. The interesting part about it is he
Speaker 1: did it during Magic and Birds Watch. UM I had
Speaker 1: him just barely over Isaiah Thomas here. Isaiah Thomas's team
Speaker 1: was more successful, but I did think Julius was a
Speaker 1: slightly better player. UM So, where does Steph fit in
Speaker 1: this list? That's the question. Let's take a quick look
Speaker 1: at his resume. So step is a four time champion
Speaker 1: now one time finals MVP should be too. A two
Speaker 1: time m v P, an eight time All Star, four
Speaker 1: time first Team All m b A, eight time All
Speaker 1: m B A overall in a two time scoring champ.
Speaker 1: Just that resume before we get any deeper into the woods,
Speaker 1: before we even consider all of the details. In the
Speaker 1: context that automatic puts in ahead of dr j had
Speaker 1: A Janice had A Dwayne Wade and headed Kevin Durant,
Speaker 1: and there's a healthy gap there. So he can be
Speaker 1: no lower than the sixth the best perimeter player since night.
Speaker 1: So I don't think that Steph has a case over Magic,
Speaker 1: and I don't think that Steph fans would disagree with me.
Speaker 1: I mean, Magic's a three time m v P, five
Speaker 1: time champion during an era when the league was stacked
Speaker 1: with talent. This was before talent delustion, this was before
Speaker 1: they expanded the number of teams, a similar type of
Speaker 1: role to Steph two in that franchise cornerstone type of
Speaker 1: type of roles. So I don't I think he's got
Speaker 1: some ground to cover to get into that Magic Johnson conversation,
Speaker 1: which means that the debate here is is who's at
Speaker 1: number five? Are we putting Larry Bird at number five?
Speaker 1: Are we putting Steph Curry at number five? Al Right, guys,
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Speaker 1: I would make. I would take the Dallas Cowboys win
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Speaker 1: and so I wanted to dive into that a bit.
Speaker 1: So Larry Bird's peak was higher in my opinion. From
Speaker 1: nine eighty six he won three consecutive m v P
Speaker 1: s and two championships and one finals MVP in both
Speaker 1: championships N six During the regular season during that three
Speaker 1: year span, he average twenty six ten and seven on
Speaker 1: fifty from the field from three and eight percent from
Speaker 1: the line, so he's basically the original guy. In the playoffs,
Speaker 1: the scoring went up a little bit twenty seven ten
Speaker 1: and seven from the field thirty eight percent from three
Speaker 1: percent from the line, so he was the original hyper
Speaker 1: efficient score. So his peak, if you're just looking at
Speaker 1: just that three year window, three m vps, two finals, MVPs,
Speaker 1: dominant efficient scoring, well rounded game, rebounding the basketball, passing
Speaker 1: the basketball. I don't think Steph can match that peak,
Speaker 1: but in terms of the totality of their career right now,
Speaker 1: I do give Steph a slight edge. Not only does
Speaker 1: he have one more title, but I think he has
Speaker 1: the most impressive title out of any of the titles
Speaker 1: that Larry and step one combined Playoff Run and we
Speaker 1: talked about this a lot on the show. There are
Speaker 1: so many elements that we've even forgotten about, as as
Speaker 1: if time has gone by. For instance, Lebron, James, Kevin
Speaker 1: Duranton Janice are all still at the peak of their powers.
Speaker 1: I have those guys as the other three and the
Speaker 1: top four players in the league right now. He was
Speaker 1: coming off of a foot injury. He sat out. I
Speaker 1: can't remember how many it was, something like a dozen games.
Speaker 1: His first bit of action was coming off the bench
Speaker 1: in the first round of the playoffs. This Golden State
Speaker 1: roster was very good, but it's flawed, Like it kind
Speaker 1: of reminds me of the Kobe rosters in two thousand, nine,
Speaker 1: thousand ten, Like there's arguably not a top fifteen player
Speaker 1: on the roster outside of Steff. I didn't even have
Speaker 1: a top twenty player on the roster outside of Steph.
Speaker 1: Like each players deeply impactful and valuable, right Like what
Speaker 1: Draymond does for the Warriors is immensely valuable. What Andrew
Speaker 1: Wiggins did for the Warriors was immensely valuable. But there's
Speaker 1: no star next to Steph Curry there, so that that's
Speaker 1: kind of uh an interesting piece of context. He goes through.
Speaker 1: He rips through Nikola Yokitch in the first round, John
Speaker 1: morand uh rapidly ascending John Morant in the second round,
Speaker 1: Luca don Chech in the third round, and Jayson Tatum
Speaker 1: in the fourth round. Literally with Luca and Tatum in particular,
Speaker 1: he emotionally crushes them. Both Luca and Jayson Tatum played
Speaker 1: well below their play just previously. In this playoff run.
Speaker 1: Luca looked like a world beater against the Phoenix Suns
Speaker 1: and looked like a shell of himself against the Golden
Speaker 1: State Warriors. Jayson Tatum was you know, Kauai esque through
Speaker 1: three rounds and then fell apart in the finals. That's
Speaker 1: two Steph's credit. Obviously, Andrew Wiggins was doing the defensive job,
Speaker 1: but the emotional stress, the fear of looking eye to
Speaker 1: eye with Steph Curry coming at you on the other
Speaker 1: end of the court, that had a psychological impact act
Speaker 1: on those guys. I truly believe it did, and it's
Speaker 1: an underrated part of this playoff run. In the Boston series,
Speaker 1: he averages thirty one, six and five on percent from
Speaker 1: the field, from three from the line, and only two
Speaker 1: and a half turnovers per game. This was against the
Speaker 1: Boston Celtics defense that I thought had the best half
Speaker 1: court defense of this era, the same Boston Celtics defense
Speaker 1: that caused massive problems for every other star they came
Speaker 1: up against. Jimmy Butler had some nightmare games in the
Speaker 1: conference finals, Janice's shooting percentages didn't even resemble the way
Speaker 1: he normally plays basketball, and Kevin Durant had the worst
Speaker 1: playoff series he's had in six years. That's what the
Speaker 1: Boston Celtics team did to those guys. And Steph Curry
Speaker 1: had one of the best playoff series of his career
Speaker 1: against that Boston defense. And then even as we zoom
Speaker 1: out to the totality of their legacy, you know, Larry
Speaker 1: Bird continued and grew the legacy of the Boston Celtics,
Speaker 1: So I don't want to undercut that. He also him
Speaker 1: and Magic Johnson are directly responsible for infusing life into
Speaker 1: an MBA that was losing Steam in terms of its
Speaker 1: national popularity. But what Steph Curry did with the Warriors
Speaker 1: is somehow even more impressive than that, because he came
Speaker 1: to them when they were a perennial loser and he
Speaker 1: turned that perennial loser into the most successful NBA franchise
Speaker 1: of this era. Now there's competency in the the organization
Speaker 1: from top to bottom. They have an owner that's willing
Speaker 1: to spend, a general manager who understands what works in
Speaker 1: the modern NBA, an excellent head coach, and the you know,
Speaker 1: most Warriors fans will tell you this was the year
Speaker 1: where Steve Kerr kind of showed some malleability and willingness
Speaker 1: to change his approach to cater to this specific roster.
Speaker 1: So don't get me wrong, the Golden State machine has
Speaker 1: lots of of really competent people in their positions that's
Speaker 1: leading to the success. But the guy who started that
Speaker 1: all as Steph Curry. And none of that happened without
Speaker 1: Steph Curry. And so what he did turning a perennial
Speaker 1: loser into an NBA powerhouse that will continue to be
Speaker 1: an NBA powerhouse to some extent even after he's gone.
Speaker 1: I put an even I put an even a greater
Speaker 1: deal of of weight in that accomplishment than what Larry
Speaker 1: Bird did with the Boston Celtics. So, even though Larry
Speaker 1: Bird had a higher peak from nineteen eighty six, I
Speaker 1: think Curry is the fifth best perimeter player in NBA
Speaker 1: history since nineteen eighty So the question here, the final
Speaker 1: question I wanted to touch as you know what, most
Speaker 1: Steph Curry fans will wonder, what would it take for
Speaker 1: Steph Curry to be considered in the goat conversation? And
Speaker 1: first of all, it's a conversation. You're never ever going
Speaker 1: to get unanimous approval from any one name from the
Speaker 1: basketball community. I mean, my father in law is a
Speaker 1: big basketball fan. He thinks Will Chamberlain is the best
Speaker 1: player of all time. You think I'm gonna convince him
Speaker 1: any thing like Like, I'm not. Like, That's just the
Speaker 1: way he sees it, right. There are people out there
Speaker 1: who think Kareem was the best player of all time.
Speaker 1: Most people think m J. Lebron fans swear it's Lebron.
Speaker 1: It's a conversation. The thing that interested interests me more
Speaker 1: is what's the case. Right. MJ's case is dominance from
Speaker 1: no one could mess with me and no one could
Speaker 1: mess with my team. Therefore I am the greatest ever.
Speaker 1: That's MJ's case, right, Lebron's cases like, regardless of circumstance,
Speaker 1: regardless of scenario, regardless of team, for twenty years, I
Speaker 1: could make your team a contender. That's that's Lebron's case,
Speaker 1: and it's a damn good one. So what is Steph's case?
Speaker 1: Right to me, Steph's case is that ultimate foundational piece
Speaker 1: and the three names we threw out there, like Tim Duncan,
Speaker 1: Steph and Magic Johnson because they don't have the dominance,
Speaker 1: They don't have that eye to eye with the best
Speaker 1: players in the league and consistently beating them and out
Speaker 1: playing them type of thing that Lebron and m J had.
Speaker 1: But there's this team's success. There's this like aura of
Speaker 1: success that seems to like players who come into contact
Speaker 1: with them play better, the organization as a whole seems
Speaker 1: to be improving as they are involved. That ultimate franchise
Speaker 1: foundational piece becomes Steph's case. It's great leadership, it's great consistency,
Speaker 1: it's making different players play well around him, it's winning
Speaker 1: over a larger span of time. Getting a title in
Speaker 1: two when he got a title in two thousand fifteen
Speaker 1: is incredibly impressive in that regard. But he needs to
Speaker 1: have a better version of Magic Johnson's case because right
Speaker 1: now that foundational piece thing is going to go to Magic,
Speaker 1: right and his case isn't good enough to enter into
Speaker 1: that conversation. So what what what step would need to
Speaker 1: do is to win two additional titles, which is absolutely
Speaker 1: in play, especially with some of the young talent that's
Speaker 1: on that roster. If step manages to win two more titles,
Speaker 1: he becomes a six time champion that has the type
Speaker 1: of unassailable leadership and competency organizational uh that that impact
Speaker 1: on the organization that left behind a dynasty that will
Speaker 1: linger even after he's gone, the same way that Magic
Speaker 1: did with the Lakers. If Steph can have a better
Speaker 1: version of that case, that becomes his case when we
Speaker 1: have those conversations, and you can imagine a scenario in
Speaker 1: the future where you're sitting at a sports bar and
Speaker 1: STEP's a six time champion and you got three guys
Speaker 1: sitting at the bar, and the MG guy goes man dominance.
Speaker 1: No one could mess with him. Six titles no one
Speaker 1: was even at his level. And then the Lebron guy
Speaker 1: buttsan and he goes, yeah, but you know, he played
Speaker 1: for twenty years. He wanted all these different ways. He
Speaker 1: wanted with a d as his teammate, he won with
Speaker 1: KYRIEA as his teammate, He wan with Dwayne Waite is
Speaker 1: his teammate. You can see that being the case. And
Speaker 1: then with Steph, it's I took a perennial loser and
Speaker 1: turned them into the most competent and successful franchise of
Speaker 1: this era. We won six championships. I you know, so
Speaker 1: that puts me over Magic Johnson. That puts me over
Speaker 1: Tim Duncan. I am the ultimate franchise builder in NBA history.
Speaker 1: That would be Steph's case. He just needs to get
Speaker 1: two additional titles to enter into that conversation. And it's
Speaker 1: wild to even think that it's possible at this point,
Speaker 1: but it absolutely is. So again, my list funky parameters
Speaker 1: right perimeter players only only after. But when I'm ranking
Speaker 1: my top ten, I'm going m J. Lebron, I'm going
Speaker 1: Kobe Magic, Steph at number five, Larry Bird at number six,
Speaker 1: and I'm going to Kevin Durant Dwyane Wade, Johannesson, Henny
Speaker 1: Coombo at number nine, and Dr J at number ten,
Speaker 1: and with that we can finally stop looking backwards. I
Speaker 1: feel like we've taken plenty of time this summer to
Speaker 1: give step the victory lap, a two month long victory
Speaker 1: lap that he deserves. He's already a top five perimeter
Speaker 1: player in modern NBA history with a lot of basketball
Speaker 1: left to play. I'm excited to watch it. And like
Speaker 1: I said, over the course of the next month, we're
Speaker 1: gonna be doing deep dives into each of the top
Speaker 1: fifteen teams going into the season in the Power Rankings format,
Speaker 1: so be on the lookout for that. As always, I
Speaker 1: sincerely appreciate you guys support, and I'll see you in
Speaker 1: a couple of days. The volume