{"id":93641,"date":"2025-08-25T02:28:08","date_gmt":"2025-08-25T02:28:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/93641\/"},"modified":"2025-08-25T02:28:08","modified_gmt":"2025-08-25T02:28:08","slug":"insider-recalls-the-doubts-surrounding-stephen-curry-before-2009-draft-he-answered-them-all-with-the-warriors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/93641\/","title":{"rendered":"Insider recalls the doubts surrounding Stephen Curry before 2009 Draft, he answered them all with the Warriors"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Stephen Curry stands among basketball\u2019s greatest players.<\/p>\n

His Hall of Fame resume includes two MVP awards, one Finals MVP<\/a>, and four championships with the Golden State Warriors<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The NBA community also recognizes him as the greatest shooter of all time<\/a>.<\/p>\n

However, substantial doubts surrounded Stephen Curry<\/a> before entering the league. His wife Ayesha even believed he might end up as a high school basketball teacher<\/a> rather than achieving superstar status.<\/p>\n

\"StephPhoto by Jim McIsaac\/Getty ImagesNBA insider reveals positional and defensive concerns of Stephen Curry from 2009 draft<\/p>\n

NBA insider Jeff Goodman recently detailed the specific questions that dropped Curry to seventh in the 2009 draft<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Warriors selected him after teams passed due to concerns about his NBA translation.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe was drafted behind Jonny Flynn, just so we know. There were some good players, too. Blake Griffin went first that year<\/a>. So it wasn\u2019t Steph. The big thing with Steph coming out of Davidson was, number one, is he a point guard? Is he a point at his size?\u201d Goodman explained.<\/p>\n

\u201cEverybody\u2019s thinking, well, he\u2019s got to be a point guard. And it\u2019s funny because if you told Steph, \u2018hey, you know what? We need you to run the team and just make people better\u2019 I think he could have done it.\u201d<\/p>\n

The primary concerns centered on his positional fit and defensive limitations. Teams questioned whether his Davidson success would translate against elite NBA competition.<\/p>\n

\u201cNumber two, can he guard anybody? And he couldn\u2019t. Coming out of Davidson, he could not guard anybody. He turned himself into an above average defender over time. But I mean there were a lot of questions about Curry coming out of Davidson that whether he would translate to the NBA,\u201d Goodman added.<\/p>\n

Curry systematically addressed every pre-draft weakness throughout career<\/p>\n

Curry methodically answered each concern raised during his draft evaluation. He developed into one of the league\u2019s premier point guards despite initial positional questions.<\/p>\n

While not a traditional playmaker focused on setting up teammates, Curry consistently averaged seven to eight assists per game throughout his prime seasons.<\/p>\n

His ability to create opportunities through gravity<\/a> and off-ball movement revolutionized the position.<\/p>\n

Defensively, Curry transformed from a liability into a competent contributor. His career average of 1.5 steals per game demonstrates adequate defensive impact, while his improved positioning and effort made him serviceable rather than exploitable.<\/p>\n

Curry\u2019s journey from seventh pick with significant questions to all-time great represents one of the NBA\u2019s most remarkable development stories, validating his dedication to addressing perceived weaknesses.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Stephen Curry stands among basketball\u2019s greatest players. His Hall of Fame resume includes two MVP awards, one Finals…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":93642,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[557],"tags":[64,63,5552,590,85,7903],"class_list":["post-93641","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-golden-state-warriors","tag-nba","tag-sports","tag-stephen-curry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93641","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=93641"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93641\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/93642"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=93641"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=93641"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=93641"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}