Morey’s tweet about Steph Curry raises some eyebrows originally appeared on NBC Sports Philadelphia
The Sixers are heading to the second round of the NBA playoffs, albeit with a banged-up MVP candidate, so you would imagine the team’s President of Basketball Operations Daryl Morey would be solely focused on his squad and their postseason run.
But the mercurial exec apparently still has time to fire off tweets that set NBA Twitter ablaze – and might wind up getting him in trouble, if the NBA is feeling prickly.
Morey launched a tweet into the ether on Thursday afternoon in which he took a screenshot of Warriors superstar Steph Curry‘s Instagram, in which Curry applauded his brother and Sixers guard Seth Curry for his 30-point performance in Game 5, and captioned it “join ’em”.
That… doesn’t really leave itself open to a whole lot of interpretation. Hmm.
Here’s a screengrab of the tweet, paired next to Morey’s dismissal of any ulterior motives like, say, accusations of tampering…
I understand Morey backtracking here basically immediately.
I think his backtrack might seem more plausible if it came something like 40 minutes after the initial post, maybe where he checks his phone and realizes his words have been twisted. Him sending it immediately makes it feel like he knew how people would interpret his message and was lying in wait.
But who’s to say?
Maybe Morey is simply glad to have one of the Curry brothers on his team, after being thwarted over and over by Steph and the Warriors during his time in charge of the Rockets.
Fans would also be less likely to pay attention if Morey was someone else, and not a guy with a history of tampering fines.
Back in late December, when the Sixers were in the thick of pursuing a James Harden trade with the Rockets, Morey’s Twitter account sent out a tweet about one of Harden’s best games with Houston, appearing as an automated tweet from a Twitter time capsule service. He was fined $50,000.
ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski reported at the time that Morey told the NBA it was an automated tweet and an “inadvertent post”, but it’s not clear whether that was true:
In any case, Morey clearly has a bit of a contentious relationship with the league’s decision makers already, thanks in part to the fact that he’s more active online than basically any other front office member in the NBA.
So why would he choose to toe this line during the postseason, with what seems to be a fairly treacherous tweet?
Your guess is as good as mine. Maybe it was really an accidental miscommunication. Maybe he wanted to troll everyone. Maybe he’s trying to lineup an offseason megadeal and isn’t worried about the fines.
Maybe it’s just Morey being Morey.