Ranking all of Steph’s teammates: #35: Marreese Speights

During his time with the Golden State Warriors, Steph Curry has had 106 teammates who have appeared in at least one game. Some played in exactly one game, while others played in hundreds. Some never actually played in a game that Curry was active for, while others formed historically great partnerships with him.

And I’m ranking all 106 of them before a new season starts and he adds to the tally. Better get a move on.

Players are ranked — and stats are shown — based only on their time as Curry’s teammate. How good/bad they were in other organizations doesn’t matter. How good/bad they were on pre-2009-10 Warriors teams doesn’t matter.

#35 — Marreese Speights

Photo by MediaNews Group/Bay Area News via Getty Images

Games: 227 (T-8th out of 106)
Points per game: 8.0 (34th out of 106)
Rebounds per game: 3.8 (T-35th out of 106)
Assists per game: 0.7 (T-71st out of 106)

It’s wild to think that, in this era of basketball, Steph Curry has never played alongside a stretch five. He’s embarking on his 12th NBA season, and he’s yet to have a real stretch five at any point in his career.

But Marreese Speights — the notorious Mo Buckets — was the closest thing Curry had. Speights wasn’t a huge three-point threat with the Dubs, as he attempted just 111 three balls in 227 games, and made 33.3% of them. But he was a threat from the mid range, and defenses knew he could expand to the three-point line, so it gave the Warriors a different dynamic offensively. When he set a screen for Curry, he tended to move away from the basket rather than to it, and that became a weapon.

He was fun to watch. He was adored by teammates, though he’s perhaps lucky that he left before Kevin Durant arrived. In Ethan Sherwood Strauss’ book The Victory Machine, he shares an anecdote about Durant getting angry in the Warriors locker room watching Speights highlights, upset that someone who scores so little could use the moniker “Mo Buckets.” I’m pretty sure that only served to make Warriors fans like Speights more.

Now for some honesty. If you pay attention to the advanced stats, I’ve ranked Speights 20 or 40 spots too high. But I couldn’t get myself to not do so. Stats be damned, he contributed too much to the Warriors over his three years with the team.

Mo Buckets forever.