Few fathers of college basketball stars have been as vocal or controversial as UCLA star Lonzo Ball’s has. As his son became a rising star on the national stage, LaVar Ball played the role of hype man for his son’s future.
Some would say he also played the role of overhyping his son by telling the world he would be a better NBA player than Steph Curry. That claim has led to plenty of criticism from around the world of sports, but didn’t phase LaVar at all. Instead, he doubled down and claimed his son was better than Curry was…at this point in time.
No critic has been as vocal as Hall of Famer and current TNT NBA analyst Charles Barkley. He went all “come on man” on LaVar, telling the Sporting News the following:
“Just because you say some s—, doesn’t make it right,” Barkley said. “He’s gonna be better than Steph Curry? That’s what he said. Steph Curry has won a couple MVPs, he’s pretty good. Man, let me tell you something. That’s that AAU s—. You can’t say a guy is going to be better than Steph Curry, a guy who has played 30 college games. I know you can be proud of your son, but at some point, it becomes stupidity.”
That same Sporting News article points out that LaVar’s outlandish comments have some NBA general managers thinking twice about drafting his son. I mean, who wants to deal with a helicopter parent who also happens to make himself part of the media narrative?
Certainly not the grown men in the NBA, I can tell you that much.
However, the man at the center of the claim of the elder Ball — Steph Curry — has been very silent on all of this. It appears he will stay that way, keeping it classy when asked about the claims of LaVar on Wednesday night.
It started with this answer to a question about LaVar:
Steph Curry asked about some of the LaVar Ball comments: "I don't want to talk about that" pic.twitter.com/X7DWkZPbAI
— Anthony Slater (@anthonyVslater) March 8, 2017
Not only did he simply state his preference to “not talk about it,” Curry then pointed out the simple fact that he can’t control what others are going to say and kept it pure class.
“I wish his kids the best and I know they’ll be great NBA players,” said Curry. “That’s their job. That’s it.”
He also went on to avoid criticizing LaVar as a parent.
Curry put it rather simply, “every person should parent their kid as they feel they should.”
In a day in age when people tend to say and do just about anything for attention, Steph Curry has largely gone the other route. He’s clearly content to largely let his performance on the court do most of the talking and have others take center stage off the court.
To put it another way, Curry took the old adage of “turn the other cheek” to a whole new level.
Curry also clearly knows how to keep it classy, and the rest of the NBA player pool would be wise to take a page out of him when presented the opportunity to respond to ridiculous comments of other people.
