Ayesha Curry rips refs, NBA again after Steph’s Game 6 ejection
Ayesha Curry, wife of back-to-back MVP Stephen Curry, made headlines after the Golden State Warriors’ NBA Finals Game 5 when she asked if referees could be fined. The message was clear — the Warriors would have clinched the NBA title in Monday’s game if not for calls that went the way of the Cleveland Cavaliers. Never mind that LeBron James and Kyrie Irving became the first teammates to score 41 points apiece in a finals game, or that the Warriors looked limited without Draymond Green (who, to be fair, was suspended due to a league review).
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Given that precedent, it perhaps should not come as a surprise that Ayesha was not happy with the way her husband left the Warriors’ Game 6 loss in Cleveland. Shortly after Stephen Curry fouled out and was subsequently ejected for arguing the call and throwing his mouthpiece (and hitting a fan), she sent out this since-deleted tweet:
Curry appears to have realized that her tweet was a bit rash, because she later explained why she was a little on edge:
That makes the first message more understandable, although it still will not go down as her best moment.
In Ayesha’s defense, the call that fouled out Curry and caused him to lose his cool was questionable. Head coach Steve Kerr called out three of Curry’s six fouls as terrible, too, although he might have thrown himself in front of a certain fine in the hope that it affects the way Game 7 is officiated.
Whatever the inspiration, these arguments do not seem particularly credible. Curry had previously spent most of the game making foolish defensive decisions on reach-ins and steal overplays to get in consistent foul trouble from the opening minutes until his sixth foul. Curry scored a team-high 30 points to keep the Warriors in the game, but this was not his finest work.
Golden State can point to several calls that didn’t go its way, but the iffy referee decisions that hurt the Warriors most were the fouls that kept Kevin Love from playing more than 12 minutes. They lost this game due to their own errors, poor performances, and especially the greatness of LeBron James. They were the worse team.
That’s not to say the NBA isn’t happy that there’s a Game 7. Anything that drives interest in the league tends to be seen as a positive. It’s just hard to throw out talk of conspiracy when you go down 31-11 after the first quarter.
It’s probably best to assume that Ayesha Curry was frustrated and prone to support her husband in a distressful time. Regardless, this is not a strong argument against the NBA.
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Eric Freeman is a writer for Ball Don’t Lie on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter!
