Cade Cunningham sat down with GQ for an interview, which was released just shortly before the Pistons returned to action from the All-Star weekend to face their rivals, the Knicks.
In the interview, Cunningham spoke openly about several things, including his opinions on the top players in the league today, ethical hooping, and where he places himself in the league. Without naming anyone specifically, Cunningham criticized some top players in the league for flopping.
“I thought it was really cool that people started appreciating my game in that way. I’m like, man, I know I’m better than yada yada yada,” Cunningham said.
“But I don’t get the same respect from the refs. I’m not getting the same foul calls. So people feel like this guy might be better than me, and he’s nowhere near better than me! Or like, I should have had 50 this game, or we should have won this game by 10, but we’re not getting the foul calls.”
“I’m beating myself up over it. Then I start seeing people appreciate my game like, ‘Man, this guy’s so pure.’ People complimenting the purity of your game, I think it’s one of the best compliments I’ve ever gotten,” the Pistons All-Star further adds.
“Foul baiting,” says Cunningham when asked about what he thinks is the biggest problem in today’s NBA. “The referees have to get involved because we’re baiting people into fouls all the time…. The flopping is just too much.”
“What do you do with your best players who do it? Three of the top 5, 10 guys [in the NBA] are doing it constantly. You gon’ kick them out of the game?”
Players like Luka Doncic, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Jalen Brunson, and even Nikola Jokic, to some extent, have come under public criticism for foul baiting or drawing fouls and forcing themselves to the free-throw line on multiple occasions with unnatural plays.
Yet these four names are defintely in among the top 10 players in the league right now. Without them, the league loses half its stardom.
“You can’t hack them. It’s tough. If I win a championship—when I win the championship—I’m going to want the same type [of whistle]. I want to be able to foul people, and they can’t foul me!” he explains when the reporter asked him about Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and the Thunder in specific.
“You have to ref the game for what you’re seeing, not reputations or any other stuff. It doesn’t get reffed that way,” says Cunningham while calling flopping a “get out of jail free card.”
“But some people are better than others,” he concedes with a wry smile. “I can’t sell a foul for nothing. There’s skill to it, for sure,” concludes Cunningham on the subject.
Subsequently, the reporter asked him about the debate on the greatest American player in the league right now, as the NBA begins to see a dominance of European influence.
“I take it seriously,” he says of that conversation. “I want to be on the Olympic team coming up. I think I’m the best American player.”
“You said, ‘I think I’m the best American player.’ So, do you acknowledge that Shai and Jokic are a level above you right now?” asked Matthew Roberson, the writer of the original story.
“No, not at all… They’re just not American,” responds Cunningham.
The Pistons star is having an MVP-caliber season, currently averaging 25.7 points, 9.7 assists, and 5.7 rebounds while shooting 46.3% from the field and 33.5% from beyond the arc to lead his team to the top of the Eastern Conference.
But making the Olympic team and leading it to victory has become an additional indicator for becoming the best American player. Jayson Tatum could not cement himself as the best American player despite winning a championship and being the only American on the 2024 All-NBA first team. Yet he was still not a regular starter for Team USA in that year’s Olympics run in Paris.
Therefore, while every professional player is naturally confident in his abilities, Cunningham will have to prove himself by winning a championship, getting selected to the All-NBA first team, and then leading Team USA to a gold medal at the Olympics to have some credibility when he says he’s the best American hooper.
Without even being to the NBA Finals once, it is far too rushed to jump to that conclusion in my opinion.
