Skip Bayless Says Steph Curry Stole the MVP From ‘Poor LeBron James’

Team USA made history yesterday in Paris by beating France in the gold medal game to clinch their 5th consecutive gold medal. The 98-87 game was a close matchup before Stephen Curry caught fire in the 4th quarter and put the game to bed.

The Chef had another great outing after his semifinal performance against Serbia and many believed he deserved to be the MVP.

As soon as the game was over and Team USA had clinched the gold, Skip Bayless went on X to post a clip, detailing how Steph just took over the campaign from LeBron James and how he will be the MVP. The former FS1 host also claimed that LBJ had it in his control, but Steph’s performance has overshadowed him.

Bayless said, “Man, poor LeBron James. Steph Curry just shot him right in the heart. Just stole the MVP right out from under poor LeBron. He was right there, he was heavy favorite, and Steph made 17 of 26 threes in the final two games, in semifinal and the gold medal game.”

Bayless was talking about Steph’s incredible back-to-back performances where he dropped 36 points against Serbia while shooting 12 of 19 from the field and 9 of 14 from the three-point line. He then followed it up with 24 points on the big night while shooting 8 of 13 from the three-point line.

To say that Steph deserved to be the MVP for these performances won’t be an exaggeration. In the case of Bayless, he was positive that the MVP title was going Steph’s way. To his surprise, James was honored with the MVP title for the Olympics.

Steph did make it into the Olympic team alongside LeBron, but he didn’t win the MVP.

When the news came out, Bayless went on X again to express his shock. He wrote, “I posted a video right after our men’s basketball team won gold presuming Steph had won MVP over LeBron after making 9 threes vs Serbia and 8 more against France including 4 in the 4th. It was obviously a disgrace that LeBron won it. Politics? Strings pulled? Tell me I’m wrong.”

Bayless believes that some strings were pulled to make sure that LeBron gets to have a storybook ending to his Olympic journey.

However, it is important to take Skip’s words with a pinch of salt. He has always been a vehement denier of LeBron and has made it abundantly clear that James, in his opinion, is nothing special. But was Skip right in claiming LeBron’s MVP was “a disgrace”? Let’s look at the numbers.

James led the USA team in assists per game with 8.5 (Jrue Holiday was second with 3.6), rebounds per game with 6.8 (Anthony Davis was second with 6.7), and efficiency rating with 23.5 per game (Davis was second with 16.8). The only category James didn’t lead the team was points per game, where he came second to Curry (14.2 to the guard’s 14.8).

But in a game even beyond the numbers, James was the cornerstone of the US team. His drives to the basket in the semifinal vs Serbia allowed the team to stay within touching distance, and his defense on Nikola Jokić in the second half prevented a major capitulation.

At 39 years of age, his MVP was very well deserved, as he was the standout performer for his country. Bayless’ rants on “robbery” and “a disgrace” can be chalked down to yet another example of the analyst refusing to give LeBron his flowers.