Player The unfortunately low-ceilinged Shaolin monastery of Victor Wembanyama

[ace3g]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1979586283237454248

 

[LeBowen]

How is it blind rank if he knows everything he did over the summer?

 

[absoloot66]

How is it blind rank if he knows everything he did over the summer?

I asked myself the same question, but in seeing the actual video, apparently it refers to ranking them as they are presented without knowing what they will name next. Hence, the re-ordering them at the end.

 

[Sugus]

https://streamable.com/2wqub7

Like I was saying before, this dude doesn’t even need to dribble. He could down half his turnovers doing shit like this.

It's insane to me that people who have seen Wemby doing Shamgods and shit on every NBA player he's faced, continue to argue that he shouldn't dribble or keep working on his ball-handling, as if the NBA hasn't been a ball-handler's league since Michael Jordan came into it.

Yeah, he can pull off these one-or-zero-dribble moves from time to time, but he's also been seeking and hitting the ISO jumpers this pre-season. What you call "downing half his turnovers" is also called "cutting off half his game and trying to fit him into a traditional big-man".

I expect it from outsiders, but it's so strange to hear coming from the fanbase that saw Manu Ginobili being an unhinged wizard on the court through his career. Less turnovers if he didn't, sure, but less magic (and probably less rings) as well.

 

[Itzsoweezee]

It's insane to me that people who have seen Wemby doing Shamgods and shit on every NBA player he's faced, continue to argue that he shouldn't dribble or keep working on his ball-handling, as if the NBA hasn't been a ball-handler's league since Michael Jordan came into it.

Yeah, he can pull off these one-or-zero-dribble moves from time to time, but he's also been seeking and hitting the ISO jumpers this pre-season. What you call "downing half his turnovers" is also called "cutting off half his game and trying to fit him into a traditional big-man".

I expect it from outsiders, but it's so strange to hear coming from the fanbase that saw Manu Ginobili being an unhinged wizard on the court through his career. Less turnovers if he didn't, sure, but less magic (and probably less rings) as well.

What an absurd take. He’s 7and a half feet tall. it doesn’t matter how good his ball handling is, he’ll never be able to dribble through traffic. His dribble is just too high.

I’m obviously not talking about not dribbling into jump shots or on breakaways, etc. But, in limited space, Wemby is taking away his advantage and giving it to the other team.

 

[Shmurs]

He dribbles through traffic quite a bit. It usually turns out ok. He should practice and improve during non-competitive NBA settings maybe

 

[Itzsoweezee]

He dribbles through traffic quite a bit. It usually turns out ok. He should practice and improve during non-competitive NBA settings maybe

Absolutely. He has one of the worst assist to turnover rates in the NBA, so it’s definitely an area of improvement for him to focus on. His height is always going to make it tough for him, so he needs to be a lot more disciplined about it.

 

[Shmurs]

Has anyone else noticed his conditioning being like really really good this preseason? He traditionally sucks wind in the 2nd quarter and can’t really catch back up. But he looks fresh the whole way these past 2 games. He couldn’t play basketball for months. I wonder if he went psycho with fitness.

 

[Neuromancer]

Has anyone else noticed his conditioning being like really really good this preseason? He traditionally sucks wind in the 2nd quarter and can’t really catch back up. But he looks fresh the whole way these past 2 games. He couldn’t play basketball for months. I wonder if he went psycho with fitness.

Definitely noticeable. Aside from his shot selection and handle his conditioning was his biggest issue last season. If he doesn't get gassed after 5-6 mins anymore the league is in trouble

 

[Ice009]

Yes, I've noticed it. I noticed it after the second preseason game. It seems the extra time off really allowed him to focus on conditioning and trying to get his body in great shape. He did say he worked harder than ever before. He also said that no one's worked harder this offseason than him, but I think he was just emphasizing how hard he's worked.

 

[ace3g]

 

[Sugus]

What an absurd take. He’s 7and a half feet tall. it doesn’t matter how good his ball handling is, he’ll never be able to dribble through traffic. His dribble is just too high.

I’m obviously not talking about not dribbling into jump shots or on breakaways, etc. But, in limited space, Wemby is taking away his advantage and giving it to the other team.

It's your take that's absurd -- how could his ball handling ability not matter? Lol? As if every player is built the same, just check their height and go? Quick, someone go and show this take to Kevin Durant, famously unable to drive to the hoop or dribble at an NBA level...........

Yes, his bodily composition provides a natural disadvantage when dribbling on traffic - which means exactly zero as to his ability to 1) improve his handle in traffic itself, and 2) gain experience (by being stripped in-game!) and wisdom as to when the situation is congested enough that he shouldn't attempt to dribble, and when it's not.

He is obviously beyond capable of bringing the ball up, dribble combos and moves, and advanced ISO moves.... Just crazy to think he should forgo that part of his game on the chance that he's stripped of the ball.

Crazy to think this shit is what Kareem had to hear throughout his entire career, what wasted potential...

 

[Itzsoweezee]

It's your take that's absurd -- how could his ball handling ability not matter? Lol? As if every player is built the same, just check their height and go? Quick, someone go and show this take to Kevin Durant, famously unable to drive to the hoop or dribble at an NBA level...........

Yes, his bodily composition provides a natural disadvantage when dribbling on traffic - which means exactly zero as to his ability to 1) improve his handle in traffic itself, and 2) gain experience (by being stripped in-game!) and wisdom as to when the situation is congested enough that he shouldn't attempt to dribble, and when it's not.

He is obviously beyond capable of bringing the ball up, dribble combos and moves, and advanced ISO moves.... Just crazy to think he should forgo that part of his game on the chance that he's stripped of the ball.

Crazy to think this shit is what Kareem had to hear throughout his entire career, what wasted potential...

You’re unhinged. Making straw man arguments to rant against.

Go yell at the moon old man. Talking about “magic” on a basketball message board. Wtf

 

[ambchang]

A lot of Wembys TOs are the WTF types where he just somehow passed to the other team in simple passes. If he is more careful with the ball and stay alert for every possession he’d probably cut his preseason TO by half.

It would be great if he can improve his handles but I think there are two things he can do to cut down turnovers. One is to be more careful with the ball like I said earlier, the other thing is for him to use his body to his advantage, where he uses his long frame and off arm to shield the ball from the defenders. Once he aced those two things he should be fine.

 

[OK Computer]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1980095257946583136

 

[dn0774]

Has anyone else noticed his conditioning being like really really good this preseason? He traditionally sucks wind in the 2nd quarter and can’t really catch back up. But he looks fresh the whole way these past 2 games. He couldn’t play basketball for months. I wonder if he went psycho with fitness.

I’ve watched almost every game of his since he was drafted, this is easily the best I’ve ever seen his wind. It actually makes me wonder for how long he had been physically compromised by the dvt prior to it being discovered.

He clearly was in rough shape starting in January of this year.

 

[ace3g]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1980110814016147713

 

[scott]

I timestamped it but RJ said that rumors from the basketball world are that "very early on, Wemby told the people in San Antonio I need some more help." It's not a big deal but I found it interesting since what 19, 20 year old does that

I was a big of a credit of the FO as anyone, but I got to give them their props. Through some proactivity, some luck, and some help from Klutch, we have completely changed the complexity of this roster from the moment Wemby was drafted, and we did it the “Spurs way”. Yes, that means we still have some amigos who maybe might be a little out of place (if you know what I mean), but this looks like a coherent team. Yes, it still has some worts, but I think we’re going to be quite good.

 

[Ariel]

I was a big of a credit of the FO as anyone, but I got to give them their props. Through some proactivity, some luck, and some help from Klutch, we have completely changed the complexity of this roster from the moment Wemby was drafted, and we did it the “Spurs way”. Yes, that means we still have some amigos who maybe might be a little out of place (if you know what I mean), but this looks like a coherent team. Yes, it still has some worts, but I think we’re going to be quite good.

I've credited Brian Wright when I thought he did well, which is mostly in trades. The Champagnie signing was also really good, the Kornet pickup I really like. There are other areas where they didn't do so well, like the contracts they handed to their own players (Vassell, Zach Collins, Keldon), drafting non top 4 picks (Vassell, Primo, Sochan, Branham, Wesley).

Especially the 2nd rounders are baffling, I know people would say they're a crap shoot either way, but somebody explain to me what was the plan drafting Juan Nuñez, an extremely slow and unathletic non-shooter at PG, there was zero chance that pick could work. Harrison Ingram is a really low upside kind of player, archetype alone makes it very hard to make it in the league. If you're going to take a flyer on a guy, do it on someone who at least has a non-zero chance of sticking in the league, like Johnny Furphy for instance, I don't know if the guy will hit but clearly he's got a viable archetype and we saw it at the time.

I wrote all that to say: we cannot simply underestimate the impact luck has had in the Spurs present. Landing Wemby in 2023 was franchise altering (14% chance), the following 2 years they were more likely than not to stay outside the top 4, 58% chance of drafting 5-9 in 2024 and 74% chance of drafting 8-12 in 2025. Those picks resulted in the most promising young players we have outside of Wemby (Castle and Harper). Can you imagine, IDK, Ausar Thompson, Salaun and Coward in their place? How different would the outlook for the Spurs be?

Bottom line, not only did luck play a HUGE role in the Spurs bring future, I'd argue it's probably THE single most important factor, let's hope the FO realizes this and they don't overestimate their abilities.

 

[STAT88]

Great point Ariel. We could easily have this lineup if the ping pong balls bounced differently in 23, 24, 25.

Scoot
Vassell
Keldon
Salaun
Maluach

And there would probably be no baseline bums cause no one would want to talk about that squad.

 

[Ice009]

I’ve watched almost every game of his since he was drafted, this is easily the best I’ve ever seen his wind. It actually makes me wonder for how long he had been physically compromised by the dvt prior to it being discovered.

He clearly was in rough shape starting in January of this year.

A poster or two at ST at the time said that the DVT isn't related to how he was breathing/looking conditioning wise. I can't remember if they were doctors or just worked somewhere in the medical field, but they seemed to know what they were talking about. Maybe they were wrong and it was related, but I went under that assumption based on those posts at ST that it wasn't related to the DVT.

Great point Ariel. We could easily have this lineup if the ping pong balls bounced differently in 23, 24, 25.

Scoot
Vassell
Keldon
Salaun
Maluach

And there would probably be no baseline bums cause no one would want to talk about that squad.

I'm pretty sure the Spurs would have taken Amen Thompson (not Scoot) if they had the number 2 pick that year instead of the number 1 pick. Anyway, I am super happy we don't have a lineup similar to what you've mentioned.
Like Ariel said, they've gotten really, really lucky and I too hope they realize that and don't screw it up going forward. Their other lottery picks have been average to terrible outside these past few drafts which they got a lot of luck with the ping pong balls to get, and also, their second round selections have been non-existent/horrendous (if they were actually trying to draft legit players in the second round and not throw away picks, they failed miserably).

 

[LeBowen]

And there would probably be no baseline bums cause no one would want to talk about that squad.

Not really because most of us in here were still watching every game during tanking years.
We'd just be hoping to land the franchise player until it happened.

 

[Shmurs]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1980095257946583136

I think this is him just expanding on rumors that windhorst was trying to drum up a couple of years ago. A game of telephone based on vibes.

 

[spurraider21]

A poster or two at ST at the time said that the DVT isn't related to how he was breathing/looking conditioning wise. I can't remember if they were doctors or just worked somewhere in the medical field, but they seemed to know what they were talking about. Maybe they were wrong and it was related, but I went under that assumption based on those posts at ST that it wasn't related to the DVT.

mitch himself said that people raising pre-ASB stuff as being related to his DVT were reaching. and the armchair pulmonologists were saying that for the blood clot in his shoulder to affect his breating, it would likely have been a pulmonary embolism which would have been an extremely significant development beyond just having clotting, which has never been reported/corroborated

 

[Exstatic]

I've credited Brian Wright when I thought he did well, which is mostly in trades. The Champagnie signing was also really good, the Kornet pickup I really like. There are other areas where they didn't do so well, like the contracts they handed to their own players (Vassell, Zach Collins, Keldon), drafting non top 4 picks (Vassell, Primo, Sochan, Branham, Wesley).

Especially the 2nd rounders are baffling, I know people would say they're a crap shoot either way, but somebody explain to me what was the plan drafting Juan Nuñez, an extremely slow and unathletic non-shooter at PG, there was zero chance that pick could work. Harrison Ingram is a really low upside kind of player, archetype alone makes it very hard to make it in the league. If you're going to take a flyer on a guy, do it on someone who at least has a non-zero chance of sticking in the league, like Johnny Furphy for instance, I don't know if the guy will hit but clearly he's got a viable archetype and we saw it at the time.

I wrote all that to say: we cannot simply underestimate the impact luck has had in the Spurs present. Landing Wemby in 2023 was franchise altering (14% chance), the following 2 years they were more likely than not to stay outside the top 4, 58% chance of drafting 5-9 in 2024 and 74% chance of drafting 8-12 in 2025. Those picks resulted in the most promising young players we have outside of Wemby (Castle and Harper). Can you imagine, IDK, Ausar Thompson, Salaun and Coward in their place? How different would the outlook for the Spurs be?

Bottom line, not only did luck play a HUGE role in the Spurs bring future, I'd argue it's probably THE single most important factor, let's hope the FO realizes this and they don't overestimate their abilities.

Since 1985, any team that has ever gotten a top 3 or 4 pick has luck to thank for it, including the 86-87 Spurs and the 96-97 Spurs. It’s not just the present and future. Luck has played a role in our past, too, right down to a local judge declaring that George Gervin’s contract was the property of the San Antonio Spurs, and not the Virginia Squires.

The most important thing is to not fuck that up, and we haven’t. In six trips, we’ve pulled David Robinson, Sean Elliott, Tim Duncan, Victor Wembanyama, Stephon Castle, and Dylan Harper, 6 for 6, and it looks like we might have dodged the curse of #2. I challenge you to find another team that has never missed on as many lottery ball selected picks as we’ve had, 1-3 up until 2019, and 1-4 since.