LeBron James and Steph Curry teaming up would have been incredible. But NBA history is better this way

LeBron James, it’s been said, couldn’t get over a final hurdle to join Golden State. After four faceoffs in the NBA Finals against the Warriors — with Steph Curry’s squad winning three — and after numerous riveting showdowns since, joining the Warriors would never not feel like joining the enemy.

“I ultimately don’t think Bron was ever able to get over the history, and I understand it,” Warriors forward Draymond Green said on his podcast.

“We live in a day and age,” he later added, “where everybody who doesn’t have anything to say has something to say. (LeBron’s) gonna get crushed if he comes to the Warriors. … And I think ultimately, that weighed in on the decision a lot. That played a big role in the Warriors not landing LeBron.”

It’s for the best. As titillating as it would’ve been to watch them play together, it’s probably better for them to remain how we remembered them. Because while basketball remembers partnerships, it immortalizes rivalries.

The superteam era aside, the NBA is built more on collisions than collaborations. We don’t hold as much regard for stars who find each other as much as we do the ones who stand in each other’s way. Bill Russell and Wilt Chamberlain. Magic Johnson and Larry Bird. Michael Jordan and the Detroit Pistons.

LeBron James and Steph Curry became the titans for a generation. Between 2011 and 2022, the NBA Finals featured LeBron or Curry 11 times. Their dominance collided at the top. They forced each other to find higher levels and, thus, they represent their era’s contribution to the great battles that make the NBA special.

LeBron already occupied the throne when Curry came out of nowhere to challenge him for Larry O’Brien trophies. Nearly every championship run went through them. So many signature moments they authored. And, it must be said, they reigned as social media hijacked basketball discourse. Their respective loyalists converted fandom into partisan warfare online.

That’s what made the idea of them as teammates more fascinating than necessary.

In a sense, all basketball fans may have won by LeBron opting not to take his talents to North Beach. The idea of LeBron and Curry finishing their careers as teammates has appeal, if for nothing else than sheer lack of precedent. The fantastical scenario of the two rivals winning their fifth titles together was a script worthy of a fight between LeBron’s SpringHill Company and Curry’s Unanimous Media.

But perhaps basketball history is better served by LeBron remaining a frenemy of Curry, not a teammate. In the grander scheme of NBA lore, preserving the sanctity of rivalry. It shields our memories of their masterful primes. Who they are in the story of the league and what they meant to a generation remain intact without the intrusion of a new context.

And we’ll always have Paris.

We don’t need more than the bliss of the 2024 gold-medal push of the Americans. The Avengers gave us LeBron, Curry and Kevin Durant — with stakes, a global stage and moments we’ll never forget.

For two weeks, the Olympics gave us permission to stop choosing sides. We watched LeBron orchestrate and Curry mesmerize. The rarity of their union, the budding of their friendship and the pressure of the challenge gave it all the feels. It was epic enough to be emotional.

Even with that, the best version of the LeBron-Curry bond happened as foes.

Of course, basketball gives us reasons to want to see the two of them, along with Draymond Green and Jimmy Butler, as teammates. LeBron’s mind and athleticism. Curry’s gravity. Butler’s versatility. Green’s presence. Especially if Anthony Davis came to the Bay with LeBron — which was one of the ways the Warriors could’ve enticed LeBron but didn’t like the price to get AD out of Washington — Golden State would have been an instant must-watch. The high levels they could reach any given game surely would create some special moments. Steve Kerr would be inheriting perhaps the smartest collection of basketball minds the league has ever assembled. It would’ve been catnip for hoop fans.

It would’ve been beautiful. But that part’s easy to imagine. Harder to grasp is the potential cost.

Rivalries give eras their significance. They provide meaning to the championships that anoint legends and fuel our reverence. Curry and LeBron deserve to exist in the same space as Magic and Bird. They gave us four consecutive showdowns between two of the game’s most captivating players of all time. A 3-1 comeback that altered history. The birth of a dynasty and a new standard of excellence, including one of the greatest teams of all time.

LeBron and Curry became the defining protagonists — and worthy villains — for a generation because they denied each other. And they provoked basketball evolution in the process. Sporting mythology gets fuel from friction.

Them joining forces at this point in their careers wouldn’t erase that reality. But it could change the way we remember and regard their epic wars, or even leave us with an encore of a partnership not nearly as compelling. It could’ve even exposed their legacies to an unforeseen stain, especially since their teaming up would’ve created hysteria in the basketball world.

We’ve watched them go from bitter rivals to adoring colleagues. We’ve watched them age more gracefully than any players we’ve ever seen, and do so in a way that promotes the beauty of the game and the camaraderie of sports. At certain points, it seemed they’d never get here. The enmity between their legacies and their fanbase once felt too thick to ever dissolve.

But they’ve managed to rise above and become the ol’ heads their careers deserve. Friends. Ambassadors. GOATs.

They’ve earned this version of each other. The embraces. The admiration. The conversations courtside. The gold medal.

History has a way of softening the edges of even the fiercest rivalries. The respect grows louder. Eventually, appreciation becomes the glossy coating. Curry and LeBron have arrived there.

They don’t need another chapter together to complete the story. Maybe it’s supposed to end this way — as admirers who became combatants, who bonded as only emperors can, then became close.

Their friendship is a fitting epilogue. But their rivalry will always be the story.