Steve Kerr says not to expect 400 3s from Stephen Curry again
Stephen Curry’s 2015-16 will go down as one of the greatest offensive seasons in history even though it ended with the Golden State Warriors’ equally historic NBA Finals loss. Curry led the league in scoring with 30.1 ppg; became the seventh player in league history to shoot 50 percent from the field, 40 percent from the three-point arc, and 90 percent from the line; and shattered his own mark for three-pointers in a single season with 402. The last record was most startling — Curry’s previous record was just 286, itself still the second-highest total ever. He raised the bar much higher despite the fact that he was the only who’d ever reached it.
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Curry is still clearly the best shooter in the NBA, and at 28 years old it’s fair to wonder if he could convert even more than 402 threes if he had the opportunity to do so. However, the man in charge of determining the Warriors’ minutes and responsibilities says not to expect anything like that lofty number any time soon. According to head coach Steve Kerr, it’s out of reach:
'I think Steph probably knows he's not hitting 400 threes this year. He knows.' — Steve Kerr, on shots divided among post-Durant #Warriors.
— Monte Poole (@MontePooleCSN) October 5, 2016
Obtaining Kevin Durant, a fourth All-NBA player and the league’s most recent non-Curry MVP, is a good enough reason to expect that three-pointer total to go down. Durant is the most versatile scorer of his generation and needs a decent number of shots to maximize his value. Curry won’t make as many three-pointers if only because there’s another guy to share with.
If everything goes according to plan, though, then Curry won’t have to get anywhere near 400 three-pointers. The Warriors didn’t win 73 games in the regular season just by overwhelming opponents. There were many games in which they looked flat or just “off” — especially after the All-Star break — and were bailed out by a ridiculous Curry performance in the second half to capture the win. The front office went after Durant so hard in part to take that pressure off Curry. The point is to allow both Curry and Durant to become especially productive threats in the movement-based offense that Kerr installed during his first season in 2014-15, when Curry’s three-point numbers were merely record-breaking and not paradigm-shifting.
There’s been a lot of discussion this summer about how the Warriors’ four stars will have to learn to share responsibilities and accept statistical sacrifices. But Curry is a slightly different case because his 2015-16 was so atypical. It’s counterintuitive to say a team that won 73 games was unduly dependent on one player, but Curry sometimes did so much that Golden State’s team concept looked out of sorts. If he comes nowhere close to 400 threes, or even his previous record, it could be a sign that everything has worked exactly according to plan.
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Eric Freeman is a writer for Ball Don’t Lie on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at efreeman_ysports@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter!
