{"id":714358,"date":"2026-04-20T02:27:32","date_gmt":"2026-04-20T02:27:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/714358\/"},"modified":"2026-04-20T02:27:32","modified_gmt":"2026-04-20T02:27:32","slug":"steph-curry-shares-heartwarming-jimmy-butler-sneaker-story-nbc-sports-bay-area-california","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/714358\/","title":{"rendered":"Steph Curry shares heartwarming Jimmy Butler sneaker story \u2013 NBC Sports Bay Area &#038; California"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.basketball-reference.com\/players\/b\/butleji01.html\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Jimmy Butler<\/a> usually is the one doing the surprising.<\/p>\n<p>Remember when the six-time NBA All-Star broke out \u201cEmo Jimmy\u201d for the Miami Heat\u2019s Media Day in 2023 or launched his own coffee brand in the \u201cbubble\u201d in 2020?<\/p>\n<p>Well, it was his Warriors teammate, the one and only <a href=\"https:\/\/www.basketball-reference.com\/players\/c\/curryst01.html\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Steph Curry<\/a>, who got Butler this time. Back when the sharpshooter entered his own <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nbcsportsbayarea.com\/nba\/golden-state-warriors\/steph-curry-sneaker-free-agency\/1932557\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">sneaker free agency<\/a> and had the entire league wondering what kicks he\u2019d be rocking on any given night, Curry stunned Butler when wearing a pair from his signature line with Li-Ning during a game.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI think the first time I wore a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nbcsportsbayarea.com\/nba\/golden-state-warriors\/steph-curry-under-armour-2\/1892106\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">shoe other than my own<\/a> in an actual game, which was the [Li-Ning Jimmy Butler JB4 \u201cDark Knight\u201d],\u201d Curry <a href=\"https:\/\/youtube.com\/shorts\/SKpb6Bfa_mI?si=qd5vl5HAsIrH7WQi\" data-type=\"link\" data-id=\"https:\/\/youtube.com\/shorts\/SKpb6Bfa_mI?si=qd5vl5HAsIrH7WQi\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">said on his YouTube channel<\/a> when asked about which pair of sneakers he wore that surprised people the most. \u201cThose, even my own teammates, nobody knew I was actually going to wear another shoe outside of mine until literally right when we went to the starting lineups, and we were in the circle.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe do like this little dance, and everybody&#8217;s getting hype, and then (ex-Golden State fan favorite <a href=\"https:\/\/www.basketball-reference.com\/players\/h\/hieldbu01.html\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Buddy Hield<\/a>) pointed down and is like, \u2018Oh, look at\u2013,\u2019 and then Jimmy looked down; he lost his mind because he didn&#8217;t even know, because everybody&#8217;s kind of in their own mode, getting ready for the game. I&#8217;ll remember that moment for the rest of my life, just because it was kind of from a teammate-to-teammate perspective of being able to show love.&#8221;<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p>Butler had no idea that Curry was rocking his very own kicks during an actual 2025-26 NBA regular-season game for the world to see.<\/p>\n<p>And, while Curry might be partnering with Sotheby&#8217;s to admirably auction off his sneaker free agency collection for his own <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nbcsportsbayarea.com\/nba\/golden-state-warriors\/steph-curry-sneaker-free-agency-auction\/1929458\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">EAT. LEARN. PLAY. Foundation<\/a>, the four-time NBA champion will be able to cherish the memories from his past season\u2019s shoe game for the rest of time.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe fact that I made it all the way to tip off and he had no clue I was rocking his shoes,\u201d Curry said, \u201cthose types of moments are always fun because you create a memory out of nothing.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Jimmy Buckets truly had no clue &#8212; and Curry will keep the moment with him forever.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/dubs-talk-a-golden-state-warriors-podcast.simplecast.com\/episodes\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">Download and follow the Dubs Talk Podcast<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Jimmy Butler usually is the one doing the surprising. Remember when the six-time NBA All-Star broke out \u201cEmo&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":714359,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3786],"tags":[7,479,164,4025,4024,313,6,932,255],"class_list":{"0":"post-714358","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-golden-state-warriors","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-golden-state","10":"tag-golden-state-warriors","11":"tag-goldenstate","12":"tag-goldenstatewarriors","13":"tag-jimmy-butler","14":"tag-nba","15":"tag-steph-curry","16":"tag-warriors"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116434674877126749","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/714358","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=714358"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/714358\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/714359"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=714358"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=714358"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=714358"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}