Unpopular Opinion: Stephen Curry is a top five player of all time.

After winning his fourth championship, Steph should be in the conversation of top five player.

’21-’22

Stephen Curry, point guard for the Golden State Warriors, just won his fourth NBA title, beating the Boston Celtics in six games. He received Finals MVP for his performance.

Through six games in the 2022 Finals, Steph averaged 31.2 points, 6.0 rebounds and 5.0 assists. He also led all other players, on both teams, with 187 total points scored over the six-game stretch.

That’s insane.

To be able to put up those numbers against a Boston team who plays tough, physical defense is no small accomplishment. Not to mention going up against the reigning defense player of the year, Marcus Smart.

I didn’t watch a whole lot of the Finals, mostly because I don’t really care for either team, but from what I did watch, the Celtics didn’t seem to have an answer for what Steph was doing.

It’s like watching an artist paint a masterpiece when he plays. He’s not the biggest, the strongest and definitely not the tallest, but yet he uses his speed, agility and ball handling skills to do things that we haven’t even seen before.

To help that team, who was written off at the beginning of the season, come back and win a championship is the sign of a great leader and excellent ball player.

They had a young team that was inexperienced and definitely not championship ready.

Klay Thompson also didn’t come back until halfway through the season. Steph was the heart and soul of that team through the entire year. He was able to rally them just before the playoffs to make an incredible run towards a championship.

Steph was on the bubble before this year, but after capturing his fourth title, I think this puts him into the conversation for one of the all-time greats.

Career accomplishments

Steph has made the Finals a total of six times in his career, losing in 2016 to the Cleveland Cavaliers and in 2019 to the Toronto Raptors – bringing his Finals record to 4-2.

That’s not a bad statistic to have on your resume; however, his accomplishments don’t end there.

Just last year, this season, Steph broke the all-time 3-point record. The record was previously held by Hall of Famer, Ray Allen.

Along with that amazing accomplishment, Steph has been named an All-Star eight times, made the All-NBA team the same number of times, is a two-time MVP and Scoring Champ and was named to the NBA Top 75 players of all-time list.

That’s one heck of a career … and he’s still not done!

Many players come and go in the NBA not even getting close to one of those accomplishments.

Do you know how rare a talent Steph Curry is? I'll just say that there is a reason that term "generational talent" exists.

One of the best

A lot of people, including analysts and scouts, thought that he would never amount to anything in the NBA. Coming out of college, he was a good prospect, but nobody thought that he would become the caliber of player he is today.

And that has to factor into someone going down as one of the best to ever do it – this principle of overcoming the odds and accomplishing what no one thought.

Another point that I think has to be brought up is how much Steph has changed the game of basketball. He, single handedly, has revolutionized the 3-point shot.

To illustrate this point, if you ask anyone today, especially younger kids, who do they think of when they hear “three pointers?” I would bet you anything that they think of the name, Steph Curry.

Not many players in the history of the NBA have had that type of influence.

Not to mention, there really is nothing to hate about the guy. I mean, he’s a family man, he puts them first, he is friendly, he’s never gotten into trouble, you never see him on the news in relation to anything negative. I mean, the dude is a stand-up guy.

You can hate him all you want to, but I’m not sure why you would.

You can hate him because he is great at what he does, but that really doesn’t make sense.

Sources

“Golden State Warriors Playoff History.” RealGM, https://basketball.realgm.com/nba/teams/Golden-State-Warriors/9/Playoff-History.

“Stephen Curry Stats.” Basketball, https://www.basketball-reference.com/players/c/curryst01.html.