Bill Simmons once wrote in The Book Of Basketball about the “disease of more,” an affliction where competition and jealousy can break up a locker room over something petty. The most recent example in the NBA would be the early 2000s Lakers with Kobe and Shaq, where petty beefs and locker room drama broke up what looked to be a decade-long destruction of the league.
One place where it appears petty drama won’t break up a dominant NBA team: Golden State. It all started in late August, when Kevin Durant told Bill Simmons on his podcast that no one wanted to wear Under Armour shoes. Many saw this as a shot across the bow to Steph Curry, who is the frontman for Under Armour. For many teams, this would be the small crack in the armor that could eventually develop into a fissure.
However, a few weeks later, Curry spoke to the media and explained that he and Durant eventually talked about Durant’s comments. Curry explained that their Durant’s comments came from a viewpoint that obviously Curry didn’t share, but the teammates came to an understanding by the end of their conversation.
On Tuesday, Curry further addressed the “sneaker wars” topic during his media availability. The two-time NBA MVP reiterated that the Warriors try to have a mutual understanding of each other’s endorsements, and to have no desire to have something petty break up the culture of the locker room as the team aims for their third NBA Championship in four years. Via The Score:
“(The idea of) whether it’s a competition, or this kind of inner locker room rivalry, or a battle of whose shoes are the most popular and all that kind of stuff, it’s not,” Curry said.
“It doesn’t affect how we see each other personally, or how we (are) as teammates. It’s kind of funny, because in practice we’ll make comments about each other’s shoes. And you have that kind of back and forth. Like I said, he’ll walk in and pick up something that’s up and coming from my line and go, ‘Oh, these are nice,’ or, ‘These are trash,’ and I’ll do the same thing, like normal friends and teammates would do.”
Curry’s insistence that the team culture allows for healthy discourse is something that is sure to be tested as time goes on. Draymond Green and Klay Thompson are both up for contract extensions in the summer of 2019. With the NBA luxury tax only getting more punitive and the price tag to keep the team together only getting pricier, only time will tell if “sneaker wars” was just the first sign of trouble in paradise.
