The good news for Stephen Curry, LeBron James and Kevin Durant? That they remain, according to our annual Top 100 NBA player rankings, among the 10 best players in the NBA.
The bad news?
Their grip on those spots is slipping, a reminder that their hold on the game they’ve long dominated may also soon give way — to younger players, to a slow but sure decline, to time’s inevitable victory.
These three have long owned the NBA: They have owned its awards and accolades, its championships and trophies, its tendency to reward greatness, that sense of surety of the very few who are its very best and most important.
And despite their spot near the top of our list, for the first time in more than a decade not one of this era’s dominating triumvirate are seen as a top-three player — or even worthy of a top-five slot. Not this time.
Steph, who was No. 3 last season, falls to sixth. Durant fell from No. 5 to No. 9. LeBron James came in at eighth, back in the top 10 after playing 71 regular-season games last season.
Yes, their top-10 rankings are a nod to the greatness still lurking in those aging, sometimes fragile bodies. All three of them shone brightly during this summer’s Olympics: Durant’s return from injury instantly changed the USA roster. LeBron won the tournament’s MVP award. And Steph’s heroics in the semifinals and gold medal game — with his iconic golden dagger — were unforgettable.
Those heroics also included one of the lasting images of the 2024 Paris Olympics: Steph launching a 3-pointer over the incredibly long outstretched arm of VIctor Wembanyama. That 3-point shot was not exactly a passing of the torch — Steph, after all, torched Wemby in that moment. Yet the picture of Steph shooting over an impossibly sized would-be NBA superstar very well looks like a last, if successful, stand — for Steph and his fellow and aging all-time greats.
This could well be the last year all, or any, of Steph, LeBron and K.D. remain among the NBA’s top 10 players.
There is their age, of course. Steph is 36. Kevin Durant turns 36 later this month. And LeBron James, still fighting back Father Time, will be 40 in December. Age comes for all of us, athletes often earliest of all.
The cracks have already started to show. Last season was the first time since 2005 that neither Steph, LeBron or Durant played in the second round of the NBA playoffs — years before Steph and K.D. were even in the league.
It was a turning of the tide — a hint that their time, extraordinary though it has been, is waning. The exclamation point behind that fact was that LeBron’s Lakers and Durant’s Suns combined for a single playoff win before being ushered out of the playoffs in the first round. Steph’s Warriors didn’t make the playoffs at all.
They’re still great players, of course. It’s why we ranked all three of them in the top 10, despite their downward trajectory.
We saw that in the Olympics. We saw it last NBA season, too.
LeBron was still good for 26-7-8, and the 71 games played were his most in six years. Curry remained a scoring machine, and, for good measure, won last year’s Clutch Player of the Year Award. He was good for 74 games. And K.D. was the most durable of all, playing in 75 games for an underachieving Suns team and averaging more than 27 points per game — the fifth-highest mark in the league.
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But their age is not the only threat to their reign among the game’s elite. Other names are coming, too. Which is why Steph’s shot over Wemby might be as much a final hurrah as anything else.
There are several younger players who, a year from now, could make big enough leaps to successfully pass over Steph, LeBron and Durant as surely as that shot did over Wembanyama.
Wemby is the most likely candidate to help nudge these names from their spots in next year’s top 10. He came in at No. 12 this time around, but don’t be shocked if next season he goes to the top five — or higher.
Anthony Edwards (10) and Jalen Brunson (13) should not be overlooked as faces of the game’s future — a future barreling toward us perhaps quicker than we realize. Deven Booker (14) is largely and correctly considered the future in Phoenix, much more so than his older teammate.
Ja Morant (16) is an MVP-level talent, if his health and off-court issues can trend in a better direction. Last season, before his injury in January, Tyrese Haliburton was in fact a top-five player — an offensive force who for several months looked like a true MVP candidate. Even players like Zion Williamson (21) and Chet Holmgren (30) are capable of making huge leaps.
Steph, LeBron and K.D. are in fact top-10 players this season. Yet age, the young stars chasing them, and the diminishing prospects of their respective teams point toward an equally certain fact: Enjoy these all-time greats at this level while you can.
Because soon — perhaps very soon — their places among the upper echelon of the NBA will pass to the next stars up.
