Stephen Curry will be a free agent next summer, which, for the purpose of 29 NBA teams, means absolutely nothing.
He isn’t leaving the Golden State Warriors.
The reigning two-time MVP got ahead of any potential free-agency rumblings on Tuesday, per ESPN.com’s Marc Stein:
Steph Curry when asked if he's optimistic about re-signing w/Golden State in 2017 free agency: "Uh, yes. …. I want to be here. That's it."
— Marc Stein (@TheSteinLine) September 27, 2016
Shocker.
Curry has become one of the two best players in the NBA over the past couple years. He has secured two MVP awards. The Warriors won a league-record 73 games last season. They were one win away from consecutive championships. Draymond Green and Klay Thompson are locked up through 2019-20 and 2018-19, respectively.
Golden State just added Kevin Durant to it’s title-worthy core.
So no, Curry won’t leave. It would take a ridiculous turn of events for that to even become the slightest, the remotest, possibility.
Maybe things go horribly wrong for this Warriors core. Maybe Durant hates it and leaves next summer as a free-agent himself. Maybe Golden State, for some unfathomable reason, doesn’t play like anything resembling a title contender, a la the 2012-13 Los Angeles Lakers.
Even then, with any or all of those longer than long shots being actualized, Curry’s return to the Warriors would be viewed as a formality.
Golden State can offer him more years and money than any other suitor. So unless the front office, in the wake of injuries to their star or a bizarre fit of disrespect, peddle less than the max to Curry next summer, there’s no reason, absolutely none, to believe he’ll even partially entertain leaving the Dubs in less than one year’s time.
