Player The unfortunately low-ceilinged Shaolin monastery of Victor Wembanyama

nobody’s been as big, lithe and skilled as Wemby. imo this is just him being honest, something most athletes wouldn’t openly admit. Still calling a 15 year career minimum
 
Last edited:
I don't fully agree with what some of you guys are saying.

I posted in the game thread and a couple of other people have also pointed it out. It may not be his solely size, it could simply be the load he's carrying. A lot of people just don't get how much of a load he's carrying.
If any of you have ever played basketball, try playing every game all out on both defense and offense and tell me how you feel. I don't think any of us have played anywhere near an 82 game season (maybe some here have played that many games) at anywhere near this level playing both ends of the court.

Even Kawhi wasn't able to keep it up and he's not a big/tall guy. Kawhi played his ass off on both defense and offense during the 2016/2017 season for the Spurs, and then he ended up taking almost the whole of the next season off (We still don't know if that injury was legit, but still, he ended up missing most of the next season). That's the last time I saw a player play MVP level on both defense and offense like Victor is doing now. It is NOT easy. It is fucking tough. It's a huge load to carry. Maybe Victor's size has something to do with it, BUT it could also just simply be that he's trying to play MVP level on both defense and offense, then maybe couple that with his size, it might be very hard to keep that up, and it might be the main reason for the fatigue and not his size. Also, the pushing, pulling, grabbing, fouling is also probably taking a toll too. If anyone can do it, it's Victor, but I don't think many people here are thinking about how hard Victor is working on both ends of the court.

Sorry, I forgot to mention Giannis. Apologies on that one. He's also played both ends very hard and look at how he's been looking physically the past few years.
 
Last edited:
Man, I've thought for awhile that we're not likely to get 15 years out of Wemby and after tonight I feel that stronger than ever. Spurs need to maximize the next few years, because I don't think the window with Wemby is going to be open long. There's a reason that no one his size has ever had a long career, and if he was exhuasted early tonight then yeah. Special talent with GOAT potential but I don't think we're going to see it for a decade.
you're a smart poster, but this is a retarded take. dude has the most healthy regimen in life, he's in it for the long haul and only getting stronger
 
I don't fully agree with what some of you guys are saying.

I posted in the game thread and a couple of other people have also pointed it out. It may not be his solely size, it could simply be the load he's carrying. A lot of people just don't get how much of a load he's carrying.
If any of you have ever played basketball, try playing every game all out on both defense and offense and tell me how you feel. I don't think any of us have played anywhere near an 82 game season (maybe some here have played that many games) at anywhere near this level playing both ends of the court.
Yeah, crazy takes on his conditioning here. This dude is out-hustling most if not all players on defense, every play, AND dropping 20+ points on offense - how couldn't he be tired as fuck after a back-to-back with Detroit?

It's not even playing basketball; plenty of sports have their athletes completely gassed and near-passing out (or actually passing out) after performances. Let's take runners after a marathon;

tired-athlete-after-the-finish-during-the-2016-athens-marathon.jpg


Or bikers after a race;

2023070811070-64a97aa74b554e4d47e58759jpeg.jpg


And before yall say "well that's not basketball though", I'll also bring a classic, from a Jimmy Butler game where he was doing what Wemby does every single night;

GettyImages-1228988128-1-784x523.jpg


Shit's exhausting when you're giving 110%.
 
I will happily be wrong if Wemby has a long career, I just don't think its likely and history isn't on his side. He does have way more physica//health help than the others did before, and he seems very aware of all of this, so that is definitely a point in his favor but I'm not going to act like Wemby breaking that mold is likely. We all live with physical constraints - even Wemby - and although he is special there have always been signs that he deals with the same type of physical limitations common with extremely tall individuals.
 
I just don't think its likely and history isn't on his side.
What history?
How many mobile 7'2+ players have we seen?
Why would you compare him to injury prone traditional bigs that always have mobility issues and not Kareem?

His injury history isn't concerning, either.
72 games in his rookie season.
Played 40/46 in his sophmore season, missed 3 because he stepped on a ball boy's foot and tweaked his ankle in Dallas.
Won't miss any more games this season and will play 68 games.

Calf injury was a scare, but days after it happened we saw him doing work with the ball, it's just that Spurs were overly cautious (rightfully so) and turned a 3 game injury into a 12 game injury.
Knee hyperextension against the Knicks had him miss just two games.

DVT wasn't a basketball injury.

Last season he played 33mpg, this season he was at almost 35mpg before the calf thing happened.
60 minutes on a b2b while being the most active player on both ends aren't bad conditioning.
He could easily average 38mpg if he was just sitting in the corner on defense like most offensive superstars do these days.
 
I've said many times on RealGM when the topic of Wemby's future durability comes up that there is not enough of a sample of players his size, let alone with his mobility and body type, to drawing any real meaningful conclusions about. He could be Ralph Sampson or he could be Kareem, no one really knows and it's all speculation
 
What history?
How many mobile 7'2+ players have we seen?
Why would you compare him to injury prone traditional bigs that always have mobility issues and not Kareem?

His injury history isn't concerning, either.
72 games in his rookie season.
Played 40/46 in his sophmore season, missed 3 because he stepped on a ball boy's foot and tweaked his ankle in Dallas.
Won't miss any more games this season and will play 68 games.

Calf injury was a scare, but days after it happened we saw him doing work with the ball, it's just that Spurs were overly cautious (rightfully so) and turned a 3 game injury into a 12 game injury.
Knee hyperextension against the Knicks had him miss just two games.

DVT wasn't a basketball injury.

Last season he played 33mpg, this season he was at almost 35mpg before the calf thing happened.
60 minutes on a b2b while being the most active player on both ends aren't bad conditioning.
He could easily average 38mpg if he was just sitting in the corner on defense like most offensive superstars do these days.

Legit don't know why you guys get so damn defensive about this. Either he'll play a long time or he won't but nothing anyone says on the forum is going to change that. And the history of 7'5" players and above. There's plenty of people under 7'3" that have had long histories, but that drops off a lot at Wemby's height. And yes, DVT was not a basketball specific injury, but it is also one with no margin for reoccurrence. If it EVER comes back, that's it. He'll be on blood thinners the rest of his life and he won't play basketball again. Ask Chris Bosh. This alone, makes hte likelyhood of a long career drop simply because DVT reoccurrence isn't exactly rare. Wemby has the best doctors at his disposal and it seems like he did indeed have the surgery, but if you're looking at this specifically from a statistical standpoint, the chances of him having another clot in the next 10 years are actually quite significant. Wemby's likely to have a much lower chance of reoccurance because he's going to have lower overall risk factors and he has the best doctors, but that was true PRIOR to his initial occurance and should still mean there is a significant chance of it coming back. You don't have to dismiss that. Obviously everyone here hopes it doesn't happen.

Second, he very clearly has physical limitations on his playtime. He plays a relatively limited amount of minutes for an NBA player of his age and his stamina is routinely lowered on the 2nd night of a BTB. You say he could easily be playing 38 mpg but I don't think that's true at all and I've seen no reason to believe that. That's you making up a bullshit data point with no grounding in actual data. He obviously takes good care of himself and he's obviously working very hard to improve this, but its been a consistent issue throughout his career. Maybe that just means he'll average fewer minutes throughout a long career but I am skeptical. There's medical studies out there that indicate that tall people have lower life expectancies. Organs are under a lot more stress when they are having to work within a system that is way outside the normal size range.

Wemby has all the advantages of being a professional athelete and modern sports medicine but that may or may not be enough to counteract physical reality. Most of us here are not doctors - well at least not medical doctors - but there are pretty clear indications.
 
I've said many times on RealGM when the topic of Wemby's future durability comes up that there is not enough of a sample of players his size, let alone with his mobility and body type, to drawing any real meaningful conclusions about. He could be Ralph Sampson or he could be Kareem, no one really knows and it's all speculation

This is just wrong. You don't need hundreds of players of his height to know that players of his height have shorter than average careers in the NBA. You need a large sample size to get to the true career average for people of his height, but that isn't the same thing as being able to garner useful information from a much much smaller set of players. Sample size is one of the most misunderstood aspects of statistics along with the stupid statement correlation does not equal causation.
 
Legit don't know why you guys get so damn defensive about this. Either he'll play a long time or he won't but nothing anyone says on the forum is going to change that. And the history of 7'5" players and above. There's plenty of people under 7'3" that have had long histories, but that drops off a lot at Wemby's height. And yes, DVT was not a basketball specific injury, but it is also one with no margin for reoccurrence. If it EVER comes back, that's it. He'll be on blood thinners the rest of his life and he won't play basketball again. Ask Chris Bosh. This alone, makes hte likelyhood of a long career drop simply because DVT reoccurrence isn't exactly rare. Wemby has the best doctors at his disposal and it seems like he did indeed have the surgery, but if you're looking at this specifically from a statistical standpoint, the chances of him having another clot in the next 10 years are actually quite significant. Wemby's likely to have a much lower chance of reoccurance because he's going to have lower overall risk factors and he has the best doctors, but that was true PRIOR to his initial occurance and should still mean there is a significant chance of it coming back. You don't have to dismiss that. Obviously everyone here hopes it doesn't happen.

Second, he very clearly has physical limitations on his playtime. He plays a relatively limited amount of minutes for an NBA player of his age and his stamina is routinely lowered on the 2nd night of a BTB. You say he could easily be playing 38 mpg but I don't think that's true at all and I've seen no reason to believe that. That's you making up a bullshit data point with no grounding in actual data. He obviously takes good care of himself and he's obviously working very hard to improve this, but its been a consistent issue throughout his career. Maybe that just means he'll average fewer minutes throughout a long career but I am skeptical. There's medical studies out there that indicate that tall people have lower life expectancies. Organs are under a lot more stress when they are having to work within a system that is way outside the normal size range.

Wemby has all the advantages of being a professional athelete and modern sports medicine but that may or may not be enough to counteract physical reality. Most of us here are not doctors - well at least not medical doctors - but there are pretty clear indications.
I'm the one making up bullshit data while in the first sentence of your post you say everything you posted on this matter is irrelevant and bs.
Good stuff.
 
I'm the one making up bullshit data while in the first sentence of your post you say everything you posted on this matter is irrelevant and bs.
Good stuff.

I mean ok, cool. Freel free to ignore all my irrelevant posts instead of replying to them then. Its weird to reply to people who are irrelevant but here you are doing just that. Do you know what irrelevant means?
 
I mean ok, cool. Freel free to ignore all my irrelevant posts instead of replying to them then. Its weird to reply to people who are irrelevant but here you are doing just that. Do you know what irrelevant means?
What? I replied to you, then you followed it up with basically saying everything we post in here is nonsense. If you said that right away, I wouldn't have replied in the first place.

DVT is a career ender if it happens again, but can't be looked at in the same context as basketball injuries. Ausar Thompson had DVT last year and noone is talking about him being the next Chris Bosh.
Everything else you posted basically boils down "tall men injury prone".
 
What? I replied to you, then you followed it up with basically saying everything we post in here is nonsense. If you said that right away, I wouldn't have replied in the first place.

DVT is a career ender if it happens again, but can't be looked at in the same context as basketball injuries. Ausar Thompson had DVT last year and noone is talking about him being the next Chris Bosh.
Everything else you posted basically boils down "tall men injury prone".

Who cares if its a basketball injury or not? Why are you putting that caveat on it? I sure AF have not. If you think the rest I posted boils down to tall people get injured more, you didn't read very well. I'm literally talking about his minutes played history and the very clear scientific studies that show that being tall isn't a physiological hinderance. None of that is conclusive, but its a clear trend that isn't for the better.

You literally made up a MPG mark that he allegedly could be playing. That is just bullshit you made up. How many times in his career has Wemby even played over 38 minutes? Is it even over 10?
 
None of us know the future and if Wemby plays a long time I will be happy as hell. Y'all can tell me how wrong I was the way Scott loves to tell me how wrong I was about Keldon making an ASG (although if he somehow does make one then I don't know what Scott will have - probably old USMNT takes) but what you can't say is that I'm just being irrational about a man who is 7'5", cannot play sustained minutes at a young age, and has had DVT.
 
Back
Top