Victor Wembanyama is not your typical human being, he won’t fit in many rooms and is a true basketball anomaly. I grew up mesmerized watching Dirk Nowitzki shoot jumpers from all over the floor at over 7 foot tall and the ball hit nothing but the nylon 80-90 percent of the time. The top of the key jumper from Dirk was poetry in motion and here we have Victor Wembanyama who is ready to revolutionalize the NBA and do not only everything Dirk Nowitzki did but also be able to anchor the rim much like a prime Dikembe Mutombo which was flat out terrifying if you ask me since I witnessed with my own 2 eyes how effective Mutombo was for the Sixers in the early 2000’s. At this moment we’ve heard several NBA superstars such as Stephen Curry,LeBron James,and Giannis Antetokoumpo chime in on the young prospect and it’s been nothing but raving reviews so at the very least this kid will be a star at the NBA level which means at worst he’ll be a second option on a championship team which is definitely worth considering tanking the season for.
At the moment teams that come to mind that could draft Victor would be the Utah Jazz,Oklahoma City Thunder,San Antonio Spurs, and maybe the Orlando Magic if Jonathan Isaac to no one’s surprise suffers yet another injury but after drafting Paolo Banchero the Magic could be thinking playoffs, just ask Markelle Fultz who has them pecked as a top 5 seed in the Eastern Conference this coming season. The Houston Rockets look rather settled in with Jalen Green,Alperen Sengun,and Jabari Smith Jr going forward but if they were able to draft Victor Wembanyama they might be able to pull off the first 3-peat we’ve seen since Kobe-Shaq 2000-2002 by the time 2030 comes around. The only two teams that make logical sense are the Utah Jazz and San Antonio Spurs being that Gregg Poppovich is on his last legs in San Antonio and after trading away Dejounte Murray even if Keldon Johnson plays at an all-star level there are too many question marks beyond him to even worry about making a run this coming season. Not many names pop out to me beyond Keldon Johnson,Joshua Primo,Devin Vassell, and Jakob Poetl and yes I’m done believing Zach Collins will be the next Rik Smits.
Danny Ainge has already spoken about his masterplan to build a title contender for the Utah Jazz fanbase after they bombed the Donovan Mitchell/Rudy Gobert experiment and we all just grew to accept that Rudy Gobert won’t ever be a reliable 2nd option in the playoffs. Danny Ainge could just allow Collin Sexton to have his own Allen Iverson like experience in Utah for 1 season and let that result in 28-33 wins putting the Jazz in a good position to be able to draft Victor Wembanyama and put themselves in a position where they will be another grand-slam in the following draft from fielding a team capable of being a perennial title contender. I can’t gauge the talent in the 2024 and 2025 NBA Draft just yet but Danny Ainge could very well pull a Sam Presti and hit 3 grand-slams in a row when he drafted Kevin Durant,Russell Westbrook,and James Harden from 2007-2009 and could’ve had a dynasty Sam was just cheap to keep. Had he knows James Harden was not going to play about his money he should’ve broke the bank for him and they’d all be 2-3 champions right now and we would actually put some value on the rings Kevin Durant would’ve won in Oklahoma City.
Social-media is bigger than ever now and there hasn’t been this much buzz over a possible 1st overall pick since Zion Williamson who uptil now hasn’t proven much at the NBA level aside from proving he can light an entire room up with his pearly whites and give us shades of a young Shaquille O’Neal from time to time. Watching the way Victor moves on the court and how a team like the Golden State Warriors plays defense he’ll have every counter move in the book on the low post and be able to punish a switch heavy defense with his ability to shoot over anyone and from anywhere on the floor. I still panic a ton watching him over dribble at times when he tries to gain position down low and create space for a fall-away jumper because being that he is so high off the ground at over 7″3′ he’ll be vulnerable to get pick-pocketed on traps and blind side help at the NBA level.
Just hope this won’t be yet another episode of Yao Ming who was a can’t miss prospect and became a top 10 maybe even top 5 player at his peak but whose NBA career was short-lived due to physical conditions which stopped him from running up and down an NBA floor through a full 82 games. Yao did not have the same mobility,handles,wingspan, and shooting Victor possesses, Yao was more of a power player who could overwhelm you with his size and strength and made you evaluate whether it was even worth contesting him at the rim. Yao Ming was a decent floor spacer from 15 foot out and a good rebounder and shot blocker but he was too slow footed to be able to deal with the defenses of today, Victor will be able to anchor an entire paint and he’ll likely be the best help defender in the league being that with his 8 foot wingspan he’ll be able to erase others mistakes on defense along with being able to come out and contest jumpers. I’ll just think of Victor Wembanyama as the a Dirk Nowitzki/Hakeem Olujuwon hybrid which would compose of the best big man in NBA history which is what Victor will one day be heralded as.
D-NBA 