The Golden State Warriors face the Atlanta Hawks today in what should be an entertaining clash between a franchises trying to remember who they are, and another still feeling around in the dark for who they are supposed to be. Golden State is flirting with the idea of shopping one of its lottery picks from this strange, liminal era. Not rebuilding, not contending, just hovering in the in-between as they look to figure out how to add a fifth title of the Steph Curry era.
Atlanta already crossed that bridge. They made the hard call, trading Trae Young to Washington after seven-plus seasons of trying to bend the franchise around him. Young’s departure is not shocking. It feels… foretold. Before he ever dribbled an NBA ball, Trae Young was crowned “the next Steph Curry.” And that coronation became the very thing that put a scarlet letter on an All-Star career before it ever had a chance to become a championship legacy.
Calling someone the next Stephen Curry is like calling someone the next Michael Jordan. Or the next Eddie Murphy. Or, if we are being honest, the next Gold-Blooded King. It is an impossible standard. A mythic one. A label that breaks even brilliant players under its weight.
I learned that lesson early.
Back when I was a young rapscallion reporter straight outta Oakland, one of my first pieces compared Curry to Mike Conley. I called Conley “the homeless man’s Steph Curry.” I meant no disrespect. At the time, Conley held the richest contract in NBA history. The phrase was a spin on “poor man’s version,” sure, but also an attempt to illustrate just how far above the stratosphere Curry had floated after back-to-back MVPs, including the only unanimous selection the league has ever seen. Conley has had an amazing career, with elite basketball IQ! A true point guard who elevated everyone around him and embodied Memphis’ grit-and-grind ethos to perfection. And yet, even at his absolute peak, he was miles below Curry’s standard.
That was not an insult to Conley. That was a testament to Curry’s transcendence. That was me trying to explain that Curry occupied a zip code most basketball players could not find with Google Maps and a sherpa. Also, how could Conley possibly be homeless when he was getting paid more than the GDP of a small island nation? The math was not mathing, but the point stood about comparisons.
On paper, Trae Young’s numbers look seductive. His first six seasons in Atlanta? 25.3 points and
9.8 assists and four All-Star apperances. Compare that to Curry, who averaged 22.4 points and 6.9 assists with three All-Star nods through his first six years. Better counting stats, right?
But Curry did that while shooting while shooting 44.4 percent from three with a .574 effective field goal percentage. He also won two MVPs and a championship while rewiring modern offense. Meanwhile Trae shot only 35.2 percent from three with a .504 effective field goal percentage with exactly one Eastern Conference Finals appearance, a magical 2021 run that turned out to be the ceiling, not the foundation.
The efficiency gap tells you everything. Curry does not just score folks, he bends reality. Defenses trap him at half court. Two defenders sprint 30 feet from the rim because giving him oxygen is organizational malpractice. His gravity creates points before he ever touches the ball. He is basically a basketball black hole, except instead of destroying everything, he makes his teammates rich.
Young draws attention, sure, but not panic. Defenses respect him without rewriting their playbooks. Yahoo Sports noted how Atlanta came to this conclusion:
This season, Atlanta is 2-8 in games with Young and 15-13 in games without him, leaning instead on players like Johnson and Daniels. And with McCollum and Kristaps Porzingis, the Hawks have two large expiring deals that will let them be aggressive in free agency.
So the Hawks opted to move on with what’s been working and get out of Young’s contract. The Wizards didn’t mind the discount price, but what happens next depends on Young. The 27-year-old guard has the $49 million player option for next season and could theoretically hit free agency this summer, but the fact the Wizards were his preferred destination makes a longer-term deal feel likely.
That is not what transcendence looks like. That is what “maybe we are better off without this dude” looks like.
Mark Jackson once said Curry was ruining the game because kids would jack threes instead of learning fundamentals. The take aged like milk in the sun, but it captured something real. Curry did not just succeed. He changed the sport. Teams now take more than double the threes they did when he entered the league. oung overcame the doubters who said he was too frail to be an All-Star in the league. But I would not call him a transformative superstar.
He is electric, spectacular, a willing passer who can drop dimes from the parking lot. But he isn’t the GOAT, and there’s no shame in that. And this story is not unique to Trae, as we know the small guard who carries a franchise to glory is basketball’s rarest artifact. Allen Iverson dragged a mediocre Sixers roster to the Finals on pure defiance, absorbing punishment that would hospitalize normal humans. Isaiah Thomas, the one from the 80’s, powered back-to-back titles as the engine of Detroit’s Bad Boys. Those dudes are absolute icons. Hall of Famers whose legacies are cemented in basketball history.
And still, neither reached Curry’s summit.
Iverson never won a championship. Thomas was able to seize two during one of the most competitive eras in the history of the game. Both were forever embattled because of their size, constantly having to prove they belonged despite being “too small” for the league’s standards.Curry erased the questions. Burned them to ash. Then hit a three from the parking lot over the ashes just to make sure they stayed dead. Four championships. Two MVPs. The greatest shooter the game has ever seen, a definition which now seems to actually MINIMIZE his impact.
A 6’3” guard without elite athleticism became the best player on a dynasty and permanently altered basketball’s DNA. He made the impossible routine, turned the improbable into the expected, and forced the entire sport to recalibrate what “great” even means. That is why calling anyone “the next Steph Curry” is a kiss of death. Not because it disrespects talent, but because what Curry did simply does not happen. Ever. It is like calling someone the next Shakespeare or the next Tupac. You are not setting a bar; you are setting a trap.
Young’s farewell to Atlanta spoke about wanting to “see what’s possible when the support is real and the vision is clear.” The implication is obvious: ATLANTA DON’T KNOW WHAT THEY DOIN’.
But the Hawks quietly told their own truth. They pivoted toward size, versatility, and defense with Jalen Johnson, Dyson Daniels, Onyeka Okongwu, and Nickeil Alexander-Walker. Less fireworks and more function. They chose the hope of winning over entertainment, substance over style.
Tonight, when the Warriors take the floor, Curry will once again show the difference. Not just with shooting, though that remains alien. Not just with handles or IQ, though both are elite. But with the way coaches drown in panic as their schemes unravel. The way the game itself bends around his presence like light around a star.
There will never be another Steph Curry.
Not because future guards lack talent, but because transcendence like this requires a perfect storm of skill, timing, circumstance, and audacity that refuses replication. It requires being simultaneously underestimated and unstoppable. It requires changing the game while making it look effortless. It requires being drafted by a broken franchise and dragging them to the top of the mountain because God has made you that darn good and you have the teammates and organization to do whatever it takes to ride with you.
Maybe we should stop trying to find the next version of Curry and just appreciate the current one while it is still here, still dropping 30-footers like they are layups, still making the impossible look routine.Because once Curry is done, we are going to spend decades telling our kids about what we witnessed. And they are not going to believe us until they watch the tape.