Modern media has brought us some excellent basketball fiction, just as it has brought us some absolutely idiotic stories from the same topic. NBA 2K16’s career mode saw a character whose full legal name was “Frequency Vibrations.” The 2002 film, Double Teamed, featured the worst travel of all time and a completely nonsensical plot. But, for all of those missteps, we still have the greats. From Love and Basketball (2000) to Coach Carter (2005), some amazing movies have been made about the battle on the court. While Spike Lee’s creation of “the Freq” was certainly strange, it comes from the same man who gave us He’s Got Game.
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Released in 1998, He’s Got Game starred Denzel Washington and All-Star Ray Allen. The film centered on the relationship between Allen and his father, Washington. It is one of the best movies of the era and certainly in the pantheon of sports movies. Now, if the words of Carmelo Anthony are to be trusted, it’s time to find a successor to Allen’s iconic portrayal.
In a recent episode of Melo’s podcast 7PM in Brooklyn, Anthony was joined by Lee. The pair eventually got onto the topic of the ’98 film and questions of a modern equivalent. When it came to recasting Allen’s Jesus Shuttlesworth, there could be only one baby-faced man to consider.
“We all had to work hard, but Steph’s story of being that size, that small, to come into the NBA, that was different,” said Anthony. Transitioning the character from the greatest shooter of the pre-2010 NBA history to the greatest shooter ever has a nice ring to it. It would be a passing of the torch.
While this type of role would be a much higher commitment and level of importance than what Steph has done before, Curry has spent some time in the film world.
From Holey Moley to Mr. Throwback
Mr. Throwback was a mockumentary-styled show starring Stephen Curry that debuted August 8, 2024, on Peacock. While the show was cancelled after only one season, Curry enjoyed the experience enough to speak positively about doing more acting in the future.
“It was obviously an amazingly fun experience,” he said. “If I’m not playing myself and doing something different, then that’s a different venture, and trying to get reps and make sure I present my best self in that front; I’m not going to do anything just to do it.”
Between this and the mini-golf show he has produced on ABC since 2019, Holey Moley, Curry is clearly comfortable with television gigs. The question now is if he can transition to the big screen—or if he really wants to.
