Steve Kerr has given two speeches at championship parades during his time as a head coach. His first one in 2015 went off without a hitch, but his second one in 2017 didn’t go quite as well. Kerr committed a bit of a brain fart during his speech as he forgot to praise Steph Curry while he was shouting out everyone on the Warriors.
According to The Mercury News, Kerr didn’t plan on going down the bench and praising all of his players individually, but ultimately changed his mind during his speech. While his intentions were good, the execution could have been a bit better, as the two-time MVP went unnoticed.
As the story goes, Kerr’s wife told him that he didn’t mention Curry after he sat back down, which he didn’t believe, because it sounds kind of absurd. But Kerr realized he was wrong because his wife was so certain that he made a mistake. After telling himself that he is “such an idiot,” Kerr apologized to Curry with the sense of humor that has become a trademark of his tenure in the league.
“Steph, I’m so embarrassed,” Kerr said. “I forgot to talk about you. You’re not that important to the team anyway.”
After mulling it over a few days, Kerr told The Mercury News that he wishes he handled things differently, and he completely understands why Warriors fans would be upset about all of this.
“As they should be,” Kerr said on a phone interview from his home in San Diego. “It was a horrible oversight. What he means to the franchise, I should’ve finished with up with him. How in the hell could I forget Steph Curry?
“What I should’ve done is gone back up there and grabbed the mic. What I would’ve said, what I should’ve said, is he makes this whole thing work. Everything revolves around him. The whole culture revolves not only his talent, his unselfishness, but his joy.”
Curry’s greatness has been somewhat taken for granted after Durant joined the Warriors, so the timing of all this was certainly a bit awkward. The silver lining here, at least for Kerr, is that he will probably never forget to mention Curry during a speech again for the rest of his life.
(Via The Mercury News)
