4,000, 4,000, 4,000.
The first player to ever hit 4,000 three-pointers, Stephen Curry stands alone once more.
For many an athlete, basketball players, in this instance, real-time appraisal of their careers is nothing if not an imprecise science.
The blurry dividing line, that, between witnessing greatness and actively writing it.
Though for much of his time on the court, Stephen Curry has transcended even those metrics, creating levels of accomplishment and comparability in a way that is truly unique amongst most of his peers.
Grinding terminally-online sporting discourse into a rage for the praise he receives while being, paradoxically, one of primary engines that fuels it.
In recent seasons however, for those (unfortunately, most of the time) “plugged in”, the discussion seems to have shifted into a more contemplative state.
Subtler, somber, understood.
That realization that comes, as one moves beyond the limitations of youth-imposed angst.
Though much like his closet on-court contemporaries, in Kevin Durant and LeBron James, it isn’t to be clear, as if Curry is limping towards the end, far from it.
But in his age-36 season (having turned 37 on Friday), it is simply a reminder to appreciate what could very well be his final stanza.
He became just the 26th player to pass the 25,000 career-point mark last week and on Thursday night, in his team’s 130-104 win over the Sacramento Kings, Curry collected another milestone, beyond routine, if only by its sheer numerical significance. Becoming just the first player, ever, to hit 4,000 three-pointers over the course of their career.
No, it wasn’t storybook-esque in its execution, that’s true, Curry, not at his particular best. A display of individual dominance often prescribed to such moments, as envisioned from afar, it was not to be.
At halftime, Golden State’s anchor was only 2-5 from the field, 1-3, from the arc. He would finish with eleven points, five assists, in shooting 2-from-6 from three-point-range.
But how does the adage go? They don’t ask how, they ask how many: and on Thursday night, two was all Curry needed, having entered the game at, right on the nose, 3,988 triples.
And now, alone, with 4,000.
Call it, if you like, the “Doc Brown Effect” - it is a nice round number.
On his home court, San Francisco’s Chase Center (with the love from Oakland too, no doubt close at hand) Curry quietly authored another exclamation point on his ledger, in what has become a career defined by them.
The player second to him on the all-time three-point list, James Harden?
He’s no slouch himself of course but to simply inch a little closer, it is all he can truly ask for, at 35 himself, at this moment, 873 triples behind. Statistically yes, for the younger players who have reaped the rewards of the three-point phenomenon Curry worked to usher in, there is the very real, likely possibility that, in time, they could catch, even surpass that number. And not to diminish or dismiss that raw potential but even they know, whenever that time comes, that they would be following in his Under Armour clad footsteps.
The handles, the speed, the vision, the pure exuberance he seems to express, every time he steps on the floor. The once atypical style basketball en masse has tried, with some success, to replicate over the past decade-plus but never truly mastered.
For nobody can do what Curry does quite like he can.
A player who had pedigree but unsure promise. Who battled through early-career injury trouble and uncertainty (including losing all but five games in 2019/2020), on his way to becoming univocally, the greatest, most prolific shooter his sport has ever seen.
A player who has demanded respect in ever-shifting all-time conversation, not just for guards but players, period.
One of the best, he is.
He has won everything there is to be won at the NBA level, personally and professionally, although it goes without saying that as long as there is kindling, fire burns. The Warriors have now, as of this writing, won six games in a row, nine, of their last ten, in the ultra-completive gauntlet that defines that upper level of the league’s Western Conference as the season enters its final sprint and the playoffs loom.
But one would be remiss for ignoring the obvious, hard as they may wish to look away.
Earlier this week, it was announced that Curry has signed on to be the assistant GM of Davidson College’s basketball teams, his alma matter and he later acknowledged as much, the uncertainty, present in the unknown (under contract through he is, until 2026-2027):
It’s just a feeling, like, can I dominate a game? Can I play my style for 30-plus minutes? And then you kind of reevaluate every year. So I know how my contract’s lined up and I would like to outplay that for sure. But how long that goes? I have no idea.
He won’t, can’t, play forever, nobody can (unless, it seems, you’re James or well-known hockey cyborg, Jaromír Jágr).
To take it in, to appreciate it, it is all, ultimately, anyone can do.
That being, another chapter of basketball history in motion.