Mark Jackson rankled some with his comment on Friday that Stephen Curry was hurting the game.
Jackson, who spent three seasons as Curry’s coach at Golden State, was trying to point out that kids were trying to imitate Curry to the detriment of the rest of their game.
“Steph Curry’s great,” Jackson said, via Eye on Basketball. “Steph Curry is the MVP. He’s a champion. Understand what I’m saying when I say this: To a degree, he’s hurt the game. And what I mean by that is that I go into these high school gyms, I watch these kids and the first thing they do is they run to the 3-point line. You are not Steph Curry. Work on the other aspects of your game. People think that he’s just a knockdown shooter. That’s not why he’s the MVP. He’s a complete basketball player.”
Jeff Van Gundy made perhaps the best point.
“If those shots he takes, if some high school joker takes that and it’s allowed by their coach, shame on them,” said Van Gundy.
Here’s video of the comments:
Let’s be clear here. Jackson’s criticism isn’t really of Curry, it’s more about kids who are trying to imitate his limitless range and not bothering to pay attention to the other things he does well that make him so great. It’s why Van Gundy’s point is so important: if you’re tossing up threes during pickup games, a good coach is going to rein you in and teammates aren’t going to want to play with you or give you the ball. Curry isn’t hurting basketball any more than Kobe Bryant or Michael Jordan did back in the day – remember the “Like Mike” ad campaign? Whatever the case, Jackson didn’t articulate things very well.
Marc J. Spears of Yahoo asked some Warriors about the comments, and they were befuddled.
“I have to talk to him,” Curry said. “I don’t know what he means by that. If you can shoot, shoot. If you can’t, stop.”
Andrew Bogut was less diplomatic.
“Anything he says, you can take that with a grain of salt,” Bogut said. “And you can quote me on that.”
Bogut is no fan of Jackson’s so that’s not a huge surprise. In fact, he’s defended Curry before from a perceived slight by Jackson.
