When you’re Steph Curry, you get kind of used to taking home trophies. The two-time MVP and four-time NBA champ has no shortage of hardware in his trophy room, though to be fair, nearly all of it comes from his work on the basketball court.
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As many fans know, Steph is also an avid golfer. He was an executive producer and the resident golf pro on the mini golf competition show Holey Moley, and he also founded the Underrated Golf Tour to give juniors from underserved communities the same opportunities to play and compete as their more privileged peers.
Steph has also acquitted himself well in multiple tournaments on the Korn Ferry Tour, and in 2023, he won the American Century Celebrity Championship with a dramatic walk-off eagle on the final hole, becoming the first active athlete to do so.
The Dan Patrick Show was on-site at the American Century Championship this weekend, and on Saturday, American Century CEO Jonathan Thomas stopped by to tell a hilarious story from the year Steph won.
“In 2023, I’d been giving out our trophy for 18 years. Give it to the guys on 18 on Sunday, they’re thrilled, they take pictures with it, and then I usually roll off and head home, and I come back the next year,” he said.
“In 2023, everyone said, ‘Steph left.’ Steph Curry won, dramatic finish, he left with the trophy. I said, ‘It’s cool, he won.’ They said, ‘No no, we only have one trophy.’ I had been giving out the same trophy for 18 years, had no idea that I was doing that, and they were all panicked that he left with it.”
“So actually, Steph left with the trophy that’s from 1990. And after that I felt so bad that I had thought I’d given these guys these trophies, including [Tony] Romo and Mardy [Fish], when I see them on TV from their homes, and they have their trophies on the back wall, I never saw mine, and I’m texting them like, ‘Where is my trophy?'”
Steph’s faux pas actually did some good in the end, as Thomas had trophies made for the last five winners of the event, Steph included.
The best part of this story is thinking about all of the poor employees who saw Steph leave with the trophy but were too afraid to say anything to him about it. Instead, they reached out to their boss after it was too late to stop him.
Steph is renowned for being one of the friendliest and most approachable athletes in the world. He always has a smile on his face, and there isn’t a single instance of him getting put on blast for big-timing anybody. It’s nearly impossible to think of someone with a higher Q rating.
There’s no doubt that Steph would have given the trophy back if someone had made him aware of his error. Luckily, it all worked out for everyone involved.
As a postscript, Steph had another good showing at the Lake Tahoe tournament this weekend, though he wasn’t able to add a second win to his resume. He finished in fifth, while former NHL player Joe Pavelski (who finished third behind Steph in 2023) went wire-to-wire to win for the first time.
