OAKLAND, Calif. — Stephen Curry is now the MVP, and considerable clout comes with those three capital letters.
Everything Curry does and everything that is done to him shall be amplified.
Should he keep winning, the attention is headed for the nth degree.
It was Curry's two-year-old daughter, Riley, who went viral late Tuesday night. After the Golden State Warriors won the Western Conference Finals opener over the Houston Rockets, 110-106, behind Steph's 34 points, Riley brushed that into the background when her dad brought her up on stage for his news conference.
In reality, it was Curry's wife, Ayesha, who set the process in motion. Stephen said Ayesha had already asked Riley if she wanted to go with her daddy for the media session before he even found them on his way from the locker room toward the interview area.
"I'm like, 'No, I'll just go do it real quick,'" Stephen said Wednesday. "And Riley gave me the look, like, 'I'm going with you.' She wasn't taking no for an answer at that point."
Curry was unaware that anyone might have had a problem with it—and he actually didn't understand why anyone would.
When Riley chimed in to tell her daddy to "be quiet," it did turn the moment from business toward pleasure. Curry acknowledged that he was distracted in trying to answer questions once a squirmy Riley began crawling away.
"I thought she was going to fall off the stage once she started going underneath the table," he said. "I'm trying to answer questions and feel around to make sure she's within arm's reach."
But it was fun stuff, which is why so many people are even more interested in it than the six three-pointers Curry hit in the game.
And they were interested because it involves the NBA MVP.
Curry's life is becoming different. He has been hugely cooperative with the award-winning Warriors media-relations stuff, but naturally things are escalating.
Curry can see it. He had to answer questions Wednesday not just about his daughter making him look unprofessional but about his disdainful look caught on video after meeting Rockets benchwarmer Nick Johnson for the pregame captains meeting ("He didn't really know what to do.") and about the questionable $5,000 fine the NBA issued him for flopping in Game 1 ("That play happens countless times; I wasn't even looking for a foul.").
He had come under immediate criticism for failing to dominate the last round as the Warriors fell behind the Memphis Grizzlies 2-1.
When Warriors coach Steve Kerr cites "internal growth for our team" to overcome that adversity, it very much includes Curry not being derailed by his first failures upon being anointed MVP early in the Grizzlies series.
"It didn't seem to faze him," Kerr said. "Steph is as level-headed as anybody I think I've ever known."
Considering Kerr was teammates with Tim Duncan when Duncan was the 2002-03 MVP, that's a strong statement on level-headedness.
Duncan hasn't made it as easy as Curry has for people to get to know him, so there have been even fewer opportunities to get a vibe on Duncan the person. That moment when Curry sat down with Riley on his lap, awkwardly studying the stat sheet in front of him as he hoped Riley would behave, was totally human—as seen when Curry tried to reposition his daughter and said under his breath with a quick smile: "I've never done this before."
The quiet times just before games in San Antonio when Duncan brings daughter Sydney and son Draven to sit with him on the bench stick in my mind. It's basically snuggle time: Duncan kissing them one, two, three times. His nuzzling them on the forehead; their immediately wiping his sweat off. His high-fiving them two, four, six times—then her shaking her hand in mock pain. His poking her in the back to come back for one more kiss on the forehead and another on the cheek.
Duncan brought his kids to his postgame news conference upon winning the NBA title last year, which resulted in Sydney saying into the mic about her dad: "I think he did awesome and tried his best."
Curry said he doesn't know if he'll trot Riley out again for the media. (The couple's second child is due in July, by the way.) Riley didn't show much interest in herself on TV or in photos from Tuesday night, telling her father that she didn't have fun on stage.
"I know she did," Stephen said. "She's definitely a clown at home. What you saw there is how she truly is."
It'll be up to Curry, 27, to decide how much of his private life he wants to share as the MVP platform only grows. If the Warriors reach the NBA Finals, rest assured there will be a mainstream moment when the masses get to enjoy Steph and Ayesha's December video takeoff on Drake's "0 to 100/The Catch Up" track with "Steph Curry with the shot, chef Curry with the pot."
That might be good for Ayesha, who already has a line of culinary products and is setting up her own cooking show.
With successes come more opportunities—and more distractions.
Riley Curry only added to the mix Tuesday.
It'll be up to her dad not to lose that level head.
Kevin Ding covers the NBA for Bleacher Report. Follow him on Twitter @KevinDing.
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