Barack Obama honors NBA champion Warriors

As President Barack Obama hosted the Golden State Warriors at the White House today to recognize last year’s NBA championship run, he called the team “one of the best we’ve ever seen.”

Obama said:

“They play not just well, they play well together. … It’s beautiful to watch.”

In particular, he praised the shooting skills of last year’s league MVP Steph Curry and All-Star Klay Thompson. Curry, Obama said, was “clowning” the Washington Wizards on Wednesday night when he racked up 51 points, including 25 in the first quarter.

“It’s not just Steph. There’s also the other ‘Splash Brother’ who dropped 37 points in a quarter” in a game against the Sacramento Kings last year, Obama said of Thompson.

The president even said Thompson’s jump shot is “actually a little prettier” than Curry’s.

Obama added:

“There’s also (Harrison) Barnes dunks, (Andrew) Bogut blocks, Draymond Green showing us heart over hype every single night.”

The team’s bench is so good that an opposing coach complained “they have two starting lineups,” exemplified by Andre Iguodala starting for the first time last year during the Finals and earning the Finals MVP award, Obama said.

This year the Warriors have a chance to make history. Their 45-4 record puts them on track to break the 1995-96 Chicago Bulls record for most wins in a season, a team Obama said was the greatest in history:

“Maybe you’ll break that Bulls record.”

But Warriors head coach Steve Kerr, who played on that Bulls team, “wins either way. Either way he’s got the record,” Obama said.

The president also praised the Warriors’ charity work, including working with the My Brother’s Keeper initiative to promote mentoring nationwide, the newly launched Oakland Promise effort to help kids make it through college, and Curry’s anti-malaria “Nothing But Nets” campaign where he donates mosquito nets every time he makes a three-point shot.

“Keep shooting, Steph,” Obama said. “Not that he needs any encouragement obviously.” Kerr presented the president with a Warriors jersey that said Obama and the number 44 on the back.

Kerr also tentatively offered him a job since the president’s term in office is ending soon and he’s about to be a “free agent.”

Kerr told Obama:

“We’d like you to be the leader of Dub Nation.”

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