Stephen Curry Is The Most Underrated GOAT
- Sep 26, 2025
- 4 min read
Updated: Oct 13, 2025
It’s the 2024 Olympics men’s basketball game—Team USA versus Team France. Kevin Durant throws the ball to Stephen Curry who takes it with immense focus, dribbles it behind the back while being guarded by 4 out of 5 of France’s players on the court, before scoring an impossible 3 point shot. With a shot like that, the fans of Team USA were not the only ones celebrating Curry’s excellence—fans of Team France were struck with awe and admiration over such an impossible play. In the Netflix documentary series titled Court of Gold, Nicolas Batum of Team France stated, “As a player, it’s tough. But sometimes you have to respect. Like—that was insane though.” (10:26, Nicolas Batum). Steve Kerr, the head coach of Team USA, was cursing out of disbelief and joy amongst his fellow coaches on the sidelines. “99.99999% of players in the world would have missed that shot. Only one guy could’ve made it. Him.” (10:11, Nicolas Batum).
Being that Curry is my favorite basketball player of all time, after watching Court of Gold, I was in utter shock over the fact that this was Curry’s Olympic debut. Curry is currently in his 16th year in the NBA. He has taken the Golden State Warriors to win 4 NBA championships, has been named MVP twice during the regular seasons of 2014-2015 and 2015-2016, as well as being named the NBA Finals MVP in 2022 and the MVP for the NBA All-Star Game in 2022 and 2025. Aside from that, Curry has scored more 3 pointers than any other player in history and he holds the all-time record for made 3s. He is also widely recognized as the best free throw shooter in history, with a percentage of 91.1%. At the 2024 Olympics in Paris, Curry seized the gold medal for Team USA.
With all of these outstanding achievements in mind, there is no doubt that Curry is one of the greatest players of all time. His 3 pointer achievements have changed the game of basketball, including his wide range shots that have stunned even his biggest oppositions. His overall performance on the court has stunned the eyes of every single viewer that has witnessed him play. So why is Curry still not included in the GOAT debate?
Let’s say you put together a focus group of randomly selected individuals. The central idea is to ask these individuals who they would consider to be the greatest basketball player of all time. It’s quite easy to assume that most people would say one of these few players: Michael Jordan, Larry Bird, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Bill Russell, or LeBron James. Heck, some might even say Shaq or Magic Johnson. Aside from this hypothetical focus group, if you were to ask current sports fanatics who they would consider to be the greatest basketball player of all time, you might get a variety of different answers. One of those answers certainly would be Stephen Curry. Yet, it is not likely that he would be mentioned in the randomly selected focus group. Why is that?
In a conversation amongst Shaq, Kenny Smith, and Ernie Johnson—three of the greatest sports commentators of this century—Shaq begs the question: is it time to put Curry in the GOAT debate? Shaq goes on to say, “I played twenty years, I watched twenty years before that. I’ve never seen a guy like him. And he’s doing it consistently and he has championships.” (-1:24, Shaq). Even though Kenny Smith goes on to argue that while Curry may be the best in his position, he does not have the effectiveness throughout all areas of the game that Jordan did or LeBron has—therefore excluding him from the GOAT debate. The players who deserve to be included in the GOAT debate, according to Kenny Smith, are, “Michael Jordan, LeBron James, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar—and then we start reaching.” (-3:36, Kenny Smith). Shaq goes on to defend Curry to oppose Kenny’s statement by claiming that Curry is in fact the best shooter of all time and certainly deserves to be thrown into the GOAT debate.
Again, the question keeps getting pushed. Why is Curry truly not included in the GOAT debate? Is it because Michael Jordan has 2 more rings than Curry does? Is it because LeBron James is the all-time leading scorer and has the most U.S. Olympic Gold Medals out of any other men’s basketball player? Even with all of this being true, nobody has shifted the game of basketball or stunned the opposing team or fans more than Curry has. Nobody has influenced the game of basketball with the impossible performance that Curry has executed. Maybe he will be officially included in the GOAT debate by the time he retires. Or maybe some fans or sports commentators or journalists will stand by their inflexible statements that players like Jordan and LeBron and Abdul–Jabbar deserve to be crowned the GOAT. Despite all of their stats and influence, the general public and the general sports community wouldn’t think twice about throwing Curry into the GOAT debate. Some might even crown him the official GOAT. I know I do.
Sources:
Comments