NEW YORK – Victor Wembanyamas A massive shadow has hung over this NBA draft for months, blocking much of what is normally part of the process.
There was no debate as to who that is San Antonio Spurs should get by with Thursday night’s No. 1 pick, no discussion of which player might be a better fit, no real attempts to raise red flags regarding suspected pick.
When a player like Wembanyama shows up – and maybe nobody has – there’s no real reason to start drama. Spurs won’t get past someone who is 7ft 4 but has the skills of a much smaller player.
The 19-year-old from France has been dubbed the best young player since LeBron James graduated from high school 20 years ago, perhaps with some physical abilities not even possessed by the NBA’s career leading scorer.
The expectations of the outside world are enormously high. Wembanyama insists that won’t bother him.
“I have such high expectations of myself and I am so determined that the expectations of others are nothing compared to what I expect of myself,” Wembanyama said in an interview aired on ABC’s Good Morning America” was aired.
He arrived in the New York area on Monday, surprised some fans were waiting for him when he landed at Newark Liberty International Airport. On Tuesday there was his first subway ride — he even hopped over a turnstile as he exited, though the police who flanked him didn’t complain — and a trip to Yankee Stadium to throw the ceremonial first toss; it was well outside the attack zone. It didn’t seem to bother anyone.
He was a big kid in an adult world. He signs autographs with a smile, makes fun of himself and doesn’t mind that everyone tends to stare at someone his size.
“Crazy,” he said of the first subway ride surrounded by New Yorkers.
let the madness begin The draft is Thursday evening. Commissioner Adam Silver will call out his name, shake his hand and before long Wembanyama will be on a plane to San Antonio to begin the first chapter of his NBA life.
“Wembanyama is made for the modern game,” said analyst Jay Bilas, who has helped cover ESPN on every draft since James 2003. “We’ve never seen anything like him on a basketball court.”
The modern NBA game requires big men to be comfortable playing off the basket, handling the ball and defending opponents on the sidelines. It’s a league in which 7-footer Nikola Jokic just led the Denver Nuggets to their first championship by becoming the first player to lead in total points, rebounds and assists in the postseason, with first-team all-defensive centers Jaren Jackson Jr. and Brook Lopez on one side in blocking shots and 3-pointers on the other shoot throws.
It seems that Wembanyama can do everything. He was the MVP and Defensive Player of the Year in the French league, leading the league in points, rebounds and blocks. The almost unbelievable climaxes of some of those plays, a slam or a punch when he seemed too far away to pull off despite his enormous wingspan, caused quite a stir throughout the season among basketball fans and even future opponents on both sides of the Atlantic.
He will join a San Antonio team that has won five titles after Tim Duncan was picked when they were last No. 1 in 1997. Duncan is a Hall of Famer and one of the best power forwards in NBA history, and maybe he is. It’s asking a lot of Wembanyama to be like that.
But he’s the best of them all this year and maybe in the last 20 years.
Charlotte is expected to be picking between Alabama forward Brandon Miller and G League Ignite guard Scoot Henderson at No. 2, with Portland perhaps taking the other spot at No. 3. The Rockets and Pistons round out the top 5.
These teams have been among the regulars at the top of the draft lately and should gain another good young player in new coaches Ime Udoka in Houston and Monty Williams in Detroit. But those clubs had the best chance of being No. 1 in last month’s draft lottery with Spurs, so disappointment had to be brushed aside before thinking any further.
That’s because while there are good players in every draft, very few ever offer the chance to draft one like Wembanyama.
Just ask anyone who knows.
“Everyone’s been a unicorn for the past few years, but he’s more like an alien,” James said last fall. “Nobody has ever seen someone as tall as him, but also as fluid and graceful as he stands on the ground.”
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