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Hoops Tonight - Why Victor Wembanyama is #7 on my NBA player rankings list | San Antonio Spurs
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- [00:00]
Dr. Leah Tritate
This is an iHeart podcast.
- [00:05]
Buzz Knight
Hi, I'm Buzz Knight, the host of the Taking a Walk podcast. And join me for an upcoming episode with Seth MacFarlane, the creator of Family Guy, talking about his new Frank Sinatra music project.
- [00:16]
Seth MacFarlane
Anyone who loves music would salivate over something like this. The biggest question for us was, what's in these boxes? Really, the most thrilling part was hiring an orchestra and just playing what was in these boxes.
- [00:28]
Buzz Knight
Listen to Taking a walk on the iHeartRadio app, Apple PODC, or wherever you get your podcasts.
- [00:35]
Sarah Spain
Get fired up, y'.
- [00:36]
Basketball Analyst (possibly Jason or unnamed host)
All.
- [00:36]
Sarah Spain
Season 2 of Good Game with Sarah Spain is underway. We just welcomed one of my favorite people, an incomparable soccer icon Megan Rapinoe, to the show, and we had a blast. Take a listen. Sue and I were, like, riding the lime bikes the other day, and we're.
- [00:51]
Basketball Analyst (possibly Jason or unnamed host)
Like, wee people ride bikes because it's fun.
- [00:56]
Sarah Spain
We got more incredible guests like Megan in store, plus news of the day and more. So make sure you listen to Good Game with Sarah Spain on the iHeartRadio Apple Apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. Brought to you by Novartis, founding partner of iHeart Women's Sports Network.
- [01:12]
Will Lucas
It's Black Business Month, and black tech green money is tapping in. I'm Will Lucas, spotlighting black founders, investors, and innovators building the future one idea at a time. Let's talk legacy tech and generational wealth.
- [01:24]
Basketball Analyst (possibly Jason or unnamed host)
I had the skill and I had the talent. I didn't have the opportunity. Yeah, we all know, right? Genius is evenly distributed.
- [01:33]
Sarah Spain
Opportunity is not.
- [01:35]
Will Lucas
To hear this in mind, more on the power of black innovation and ownership. Listen to Black tech green Money from the Black Effect Podcast Network on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
- [01:45]
Basketball Analyst (possibly Jason or unnamed host)
Why are TSA rules so confusing? You got a hoodie on. Take it off. I'm Manny. I'm Noah. This is Devin. And we're best friends and journalists with a new podcast called no Such Thing, where we get to the bottom of questions like that. Why are you screaming at me? I can't expect. What to do now? If the rule was the same, go off on me. I deserve it, you know? Lock him up. Listen to no. On the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. No Such thing.
- [02:16]
Dani Shapiro
The Volume.
- [02:31]
Basketball Analyst (possibly Jason or unnamed host)
All right, welcome to Hoops tonight here at the Volume. Happy Wednesday, everybody. Hope all of you guys are having a great week. We are continuing our player rankings today with number seven, Victor Wembanyama. We're going to be doing a deep dive on Victor. Also a little bit of a deep dive into the Fox Victor partnership, one that we didn't see too much of last year, but that didn't look overly smooth at first, but I'm a little bit more bullish on it. We're going to talk about what that partnership will look like going into next season after that. Patrick Beverly had a comment saying that if Paul George had played with the warriors instead of Klay Thompson, they would have won more championships, which is something that I disagree with and a classic example of value in a vacuum versus value in your specific team. So something I want to dive into at the tail end of the show. You guys know the joke before we get started, subscribe to the Hoops Tonight YouTube channel so you don't miss any more of our videos. Follow me on twitter_jason lt so you guys don't miss show announcements. Don't forget about our podcast fee. Wherever you get your podcasts under Hoops Tonight, it's also super helpful if you leave a rating and a review on that front. Jackson's doing great work on our social media feeds on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and TikTok. Make sure you guys follow us there. And last but not least, if you guys want to get questions into our mailbags, drop them underneath these full episodes on YouTube. Just put Mailbag with a colon. Write anything you guys have a question about. We'll get to it on our Friday Mailbags. If you disagree with anything in the player rankings, you can tell me why, tell me where you'd put a player, make a little elevator pitch and we'll get to it in our mailbags on Fridays throughout the remainder of the summer. All right, let's talk some basketball. So you know, LeBron and Wemby being in this spot here, to me kind of represents two very different types of conundrums in the sense that either one of these guys, you could rank very low because of their age or very high because of their ceiling. It's different. Like like many young players, Victor struggles to replicate his successes and he struggles to minimize mistakes. Like last year, Victor wembanyama only scored 30 points in consecutive games twice all season long. But on any given random night, he was able to reach preposterous highs. Victor when Yama had his first 50 point playoff game this year. Excuse me, his first 50 point game this season, he had a 42 point 18 rebound, four block game, he had a 35 point 18 rebound game, a 35 point 14 rebound game, a 3010 game where the 10 was blacks. He nearly had four triple doubles with blocks, a 24, 13 with nine blocks, a 30 and 7 with 10 blocks, a 23 and 14 with eight blocks, a 13 and 12 with eight blocks. He had a 2020 game with 23 rebounds against Denver. Not his first 2020. Believe it or not, he had a 4020 game when he was a rookie. These are all statistical explosions that only a few players in the entire league are capable of. And when it comes to blocks especially, he's kind of treading new ground that we've never seen in the modern NBA. He's basically the only player in the league capable of those stat lines. The block stats with Victor will break your, break your brain. He had 28 more blocks than any other player in the NBA last year despite playing in just 46 games. He averaged 3.8 blocks per game, which led the league with second place just being 2.4. So to make that very clear, he averaged more than a time and a half as many blocks as the second best shot blocker in the NBA. So yeah, Victor is one of those guys where just like LeBron, it's kind of like differentiating between Victor's youthful inconsistency versus LeBron's age related inconsistency, but just the ridiculous preposterous highs that those guys were able to hit right now with Victor women. Yama, is he the type of guy that would be super high on my list for guys I'd want in a big playoff game? No, he has too many offensive warts right now and he's a young player who makes too many mistakes. But his overwhelming overall basketball impact will easily make him a top five regular season player this year when he's healthy and on the floor at least. And his highs will literally be as high as the highest highs that any player could ever reach on a basketball court. And as far as the playoffs go, like, yeah, do I have some certain concerns about his ability to manage the possession to possession stuff in the on the offensive end there? Sure. But his defensive capabilities give him a high enough floor in the postseason to keep him very high on this list for me. So he came in at number seven this year. But like I said, similar to what I was talking about with LeBron on Monday, these two guys in particular, a future all time great who's young and a current all time great who happens to be very old. These are two of the the hardest guys to rank on a list like this. So I would understand if either with either of those Guys, if you guys have them substantially lower or substantially higher. Now let's get into last season in review for Victor, he played in just 46 games after coming down with a blood clot issue. He was pretty regularly available before that. He had played in 46 of 52 games before that point, which means in the first season and a half of his career, he had played in 117 out of 134 possible NBA games. So he was on pace to play 70 plus games two seasons in a row in two tries. So this particular injury, this blood clot thing, it's not a foot or a knee or a back like that kind of stuff that typically plagues super tall guys. So I'm expecting Wemby to be generally available coming this year. I didn't punish him for that. On this particular list, in those 46 games that he played, 24.3 points per game, 11 rebounds per game and four assists per game to go with a staggering 4.9 stocks per game, which led the NBA by country mile. As we discussed earlier, his percentages, he was 48% from the field, 35% from 3 and 84% from the line. 56% in effective field goal percentage. That's just field goal percentage weighted for threes and 59% in true shooting, which again is your efficiency weighted for both threes and your trips to the foul line. These were all improvements year over year for Victor from his rookie season. Like any superstar prospect in their first few seasons, he experienced a new peak within the season. Often it's not like a explosion each year. A lot of times like Victor actually got off to a pretty rough start to start the season. He had that early game where Chet badly outplayed him, if you guys remember. But from December 19, from December 19 to February 5, a span of 21 games, he averaged 26 points and 12 rebounds with 4.2 blocks per game while shooting 38% from three on nine attempts per game. He's just become such an aggressive, high volume three point shooter. Something we're going to talk a lot about out when we get further into this video. All right, let's dig into some of the play type data and I want to start with Wemby as an off ball scorer. And the reason why is I think this will inevitably be a major swing factor for the spurs moving forward because they have Deer and Fox and Dylan Harper and such strong play at the guard position. Stephen Castle and you know, Devin Vassell things players like that. Right. Let's quick go over Victor Wenyama's role man numbers. Then we'll bring Fox into the equation and talk about that partnership. So Victor Wembanyama logged 163 roll man possessions last year and converted them at 1.17 points per possession, which is very good. He shot just below 33% on pick and pop threes. That's obviously not good strange because he was really good when he was on the move in off screen situations. But it's important to notice there that there's kind of a difference in the movement. So, Victor, we're going to go over the numbers later, but he shot really well coming off of dribble handoffs or coming off of off ball screens from three. So like imagine just running up to the ball, catching, turning and firing. In those situations you're running towards the ball and you have lots of steps to kind of load up. You can run nice and low. You get your footwork down, plant that right left if you're running to your left or your left right if you're running to your right and you have a chance to get all that power up into the shot and rise and fire out of off out of ball screens. When you're popping out of ball screens, you're typically backpedaling or shuffling sideways into the back. Right. And as you're doing that, your momentum is going away from the ball and away from the basket. And so it's a little bit tougher to get your feet set underneath you to get the lift you need to knock down the shots. I think that is my best attempt at an explanation for why Victor didn't shoot so well on pick and pops, even though he shot really well generally as a catch and shoot player and especially coming off of off ball screens. Right. We'll get into that idea a little bit further when we get into the off ball stuff. The off ball shooting stuff. He was 71% on twos out of pick and roll. As the roll man obviously has great hands. He catches everything. He's generally a great rim finisher too. Like he shoots over 60% on layups, which as we've talked about can be a problem for some bigs in this league when they can't just dunk the ball. We talked about this issue a lot with Bay Metabayo, for instance. He's also really good at driving closeouts. It's weird because he's so upright and if there's a downside, he'll occasionally turn the ball over in these situations as he tries to kind of slalom through everybody. But he's usually pretty good at using the threat of his shot to get an angle on the closing defender. Like even if they're a quick guard, he'll get that shoulder by him. And then he just weirdly finds these angles to slalom and Euro through people and shoot layups. And he was even 50% on twos driving closeouts and spot up situations, for example. So pretty good putting the ball on the floor when someone's sprinting at him. Now let's talk about the Deer and Fox partnership. It's important to note that because of Victor's blood clot issue, these two just didn't get much of a chance to gel. That said, it didn't look too good in the small sample. I actually went back this room this morning and rewatched every single pick and roll that Dear and Fox ran with Victor Wembanyama and they just didn't connect very often, especially in the pocket. There were only about a half dozen possessions out of the entire set of clips where Darren Fox actually managed to successfully get the ball to Victor Weminyama in the pocket. I think I counted just one lob dunk in a pick and roll situation. It just takes time to figure out the timing in those pick and roll partnerships and it's especially hard with a guy like Fox. The guys that we talked about this with Giannis and, and the difference between like the, the Dame fit versus the Kevin Porter Jr fit, where like Kevin Porter Jr was a little bit slower and more methodical, which helped Giannis get open on the rolls. Whereas Dame kind of had one speed downhill. And that was something that caused some limitations in their pick and roll partnership over that, over that stretch. Dame is obviously a better player than Kevin Porter Jr. By a mile. I'm more just talking about specifically getting the ball to Giannis in the pocket, which was something that Kevin Porter kind of like naturally figured out how to do with Giannis. Similarly, Darren Fox is very downhill, very fast, not a ton of change of pace. And so with that being the case, the timing is going to be critical. And so I think it's going to take a lot of, a lot of reps. So I want to give like a, a nice half of the season to give those two guys the reps they need to kind of figure out the timing in when to slip out of screens, when to push downhill versus when to for Fox to slow down and wait for Wemby to open up things along those lines. Dylan Harper, for example, already has a little bit more of a change of pace, shiftiness to his game than Dear and Fox. He's a rookie, so I'm not expecting him to just be this magnificent partner for Wemby right away. But don't be surprised if just like the natural flow of a Dylan Harper Victor Weyama pick and roll looks a little more naturally fluid than the Fox one just because he changes pace a little bit more and is a little bit slower as he comes off of those screens. The partnership was also kind of exacerbated negatively by two other things. One, the spurs are generally a poor jump shooting team and Dear and Fox hit a lot of really, really nice skip passes in ball screens that just weren't paid off. We're going to talk about that in a minute because Darren Fox is actually kind of sneaky good at that. And then secondly, Darren Fox just had a brutal perimeter scoring stretch to end the season with San Antonio, something I expect him to rectify this year. He shot horribly from 3 and about 5% worse on his floaters than he did in his previous full season in Sacramento. So all of those things added up to a lackluster debut for the de' Aaron Fox Victor Weminyama partnership. But I am overall optimistic about the types of shots this action should generate. The rivalries, the marching bands, the upsets Saturdays just got way more fun College football is back. Think you know the game? Put your college football knowledge to the test with DraftKings sportsbook and turn your picks into big payouts. From live betting during the game to rivalry week, odds boosts and so much more, DraftKings sportsbook has everything you need to stay in the action from kickoff to the final whistle. Whether you're betting on your go to team or making moves mid game as the momentum shifts, Saturdays are yours to own with DraftKings sportsbook. Number three. Ohio State is hosting Texas on Saturday the 30th. They are now a 2.5 point favorite at home. 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- [17:01]
Buzz Knight
Hi, I'm Buzz Knight, the host of the Taking a Walk podcast, and join me for an upcoming episode with Seth MacFarlane and the creator of Family Guy talking about his new Frank Sinatra music project.
- [17:12]
Seth MacFarlane
Anyone who loves music would salivate over something like this. The biggest question for us was, what's in these boxes? There were a few unplayed gems that we had been alerted to by Charlie Pinion of Sinatra Enterprises. So we knew that certain songs like Shadow of youf Smile, which actually is not on this record, it'll be on the next one.
- [17:32]
Buzz Knight
Seth McFarlane Don Rickles went up to.
- [17:34]
Seth MacFarlane
Frank Sinatra and he said, listen, I'm going to be having dinner with this lovely woman and I, you know, would you come over and say hi? And just so you know, because I feel like if she sees that I know you, it's going to make me look really cool and, you know, I might have a good night. During the middle of dinner, Frank walks over and says, don, hi, how are you? And Don goes, frank, please, I'm in the middle of dinner.
- [17:50]
Buzz Knight
Seth MacFarlane on the taking a Walk podcast. Listen to Taking a walk on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
- [18:00]
Dr. Leah Tritate
Sometimes it's hard to remember, but going.
- [18:02]
Basketball Analyst (possibly Jason or unnamed host)
Through something like that is a traumatic experience, but it's also not the end of your life.
- [18:09]
Dr. Leah Tritate
That was my dad reminding me and so many others who need to hear it that our trauma is not our shame to carry and that we have big, bold and beautiful lives to live after what happened to us. I'm your host and co president of this organization, Dr. Leah Tritate. On my new podcast, the Unwanted Sorority. We wade through transformation to peel back healing and reveal what it actually looks like and sounds like in real time. Each week I sit down with people who've lived through harm, carried silence, and are now reshaping the systems that failed us. We're going to talk about the adultification of black girls mothering as resistance and the tools we use for healing. The Unwanted Sorority is a safe space, not a quiet space. So let's lock in. We're moving towards liberation together. Listen to the Unwanted Sorority. New episodes every Thursday on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get.
- [19:00]
Dani Shapiro
Your podcasts Your entire identity has been fabricated. Your beloved brother goes missing without a trace. You discover the depths of your mother's illness, the way it has echoed and reverberated throughout your life, impacting your very legacy. Hi, I'm Dani Shapiro, and these are just a few of the profound and powerful stories I'll be mining on our 12th season of Family Secrets. With over 37 million downloads, we continue to be moved and inspired by our guests and their courageously told stories. I can't wait to share 10 powerful new episodes with you. Stories of tangled up identities, concealed truths, and the way in which family secrets almost always need to be told. I hope you'll join me and my extraordinary guests for this new season of Family Secrets. Listen to Family Secrets Season 12 on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
- [20:03]
Honey German
Hola, it's Honey German and my podcast, Gracias, Come Again is back. This season we're going even deeper into the world of music and entertainment with raw and honest conversations with some of your favorite Latin artists and celebrities. You didn't have to audition.
- [20:16]
Will Lucas
No, I didn't audition. I haven't auditioned like over 25 years.
- [20:20]
Honey German
Oh, wow. That's a real G talk right there.
- [20:22]
Will Lucas
Oh, yeah.
- [20:23]
Honey German
We've got some of the biggest actors, musicians, content creators and culture shifters sharing their real stories of failure and success. You were destined to be a star. We talk all about what's viral and trending with a little bit of Cheeseman, a lot of laughs and those amazing Vivras you've come to expect. And of course, we'll explore deeper topics dealing with identity struggles and all the issues affecting our Latin community. You feel like you get a little whitewashed because you have to do the code switching.
- [20:53]
Will Lucas
I won't say whitewashed because at the.
- [20:55]
Basketball Analyst (possibly Jason or unnamed host)
End of the day, you know, I'm me.
- [20:56]
Will Lucas
Yeah, but the whole pretending and coat, you know, it takes a toll on you.
- [21:00]
Honey German
Listen to the new season of Grass has come again as part of Michael Tura Podcast Network on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast.
- [21:11]
Basketball Analyst (possibly Jason or unnamed host)
I'm concerned about the rest of the roster and whether or not they'll be able to capitalize on those shots, which we'll get to in a bit. But I do think that they're going to be able to get good shots. First of all, like I mentioned earlier, I expect the timing to improve with reps and I expect Dear and Fox to have a better season as a shot maker. But I also think there's real potential here for this to be an action that generates a lot of high quality threes for San Antonio. It wasn't just the timing that led to Dear and Fox failing to get the ball to Wemby in pick and roll when he was rolling to the basket. It also has a lot to do with the gravity that Wemby has on the roll. The whole defense reacts to Victor Womenyama when he's rolling down the lane. And Dear and Fox, especially if you can get him going towards his left hand, he's sneaky. One of the better guys in the league at skipping the ball across the court against loaded pick and roll coverages. So imagine if they're icing a ball screen along the left wing and he's dribbling towards the left corner, he'll whip it across the court. If Victor rolls into the lane and the guy comes off of the right corner to tag, or if he's in the right wing and he's coming towards the middle, if he manages to get middle or if he's in the middle of the floor, like where they can't ice, like if he's attacking from the top of the key in a ball screen, if he can get to that left hand, he's going to whip it to the right corner. Pretty consistent consistently and generally. Dear and Fox is one of the better guard ball handlers in the league at reading the low man and finding those open threes that come out of it. And so with that being the case, if. If Wemby's going to draw that type of attention, they're going to get a lot of really good threes. And this is where it's going to come down to the geometry of the floor and setting things up in a way so that the right guys get the ball. Because the spurs were a really poor catch and shoot team last year. They were bottom 10 in converting catch and shoot jump shots into points at just 1.09 points per shot. They have since added Kelly Olynic who will help a little bit there, but this still looks like a bad jump shooting team to me. So teams are going to guard the action by conceding skip threes. Like if I'm game planning for San Antonio, I'm defending the Victor Fox pick and roll three on two and I'm daring you to beat me from the three point line. So this is where floor geometry will be big. You have to set it up so that the low man that's coming over to help in these actions is coming off of Harrison Barnes. Or Devin Vassell or Kelly Olenek and fewer possessions where it ends up in guys like Steph Castle's hands or Keldon Johnson situations. Along those lines, that's the kind of floor geometry stuff that I think will be important to make sure that the action is as fruitful as it needs to be. And again, Dylan part Dylan Harper. Don't be surprised if he's more of a natural fit right away with Wemby, even though he's not going to be as NBA ready obviously as a guy like Dear and Foxes as a veteran. But I think there will be some natural change of pace up there that'll mesh nicely with Wemby. But with the Fox Wemby partnership, if Fox shoots the ball well and if he can skip the ball effectively enough and the spurs can make them pay enough, that's where it could open up those opportunities for Wemby on the roll. And then another thing too is breaking out the pop. Again. Wemby didn't shoot very well on picking Pops last year. If he can fix that, then he can start popping out of those screens and it gets a lot harder to tag him in those situations and it just becomes a situation where the paint's going to be more open for Dear and Fox to get downhill. Let's dig into the rest of the play type data first. The rest of the off ball scoring so Victor was excellent as a catch and shoot player overall last year he was 39% overall on catch and shoot jump shots, 40.3% on 124 unguarded catch and shoot jump shots. It was really his like ISO face up off the dribble stuff where his jump shot fell apart. Most of his off the catch stuff was really efficient. He also shot exceptionally well as the trailing big in transition. He shot 42% on 83 attempts trailing the play in transition from three. This goes back to that footwork element we were talking about earlier. Running towards the ball momentum going towards the basket. As we mentioned earlier, he shot the ball absurdly well when he was running off of any of those off ball actions as well. Right? Coming off of a dho coming off of a wide pin down he shot over 40%. He was 25 for 62 from three running off of off ball screens and dhos. Which is funny because like when I look back if you guys remember when they when his when his European team played against the G League Ignite team, the Scoot Henderson Showcase where they played twice. We did a video right after that and if you guys Remember, like my first big takeaway is that this guy's like natural basketball inclination is to be like a 7 foot 3 inch tall Klay Thompson. Like a guy who's really comfortable running into shots. And that requires a great deal of effort in footwork and it requires a great deal of effort in the weight room to build the leg strength. In order to get the lift you need to knock those shots down. To be clear, a lot like this is not to say that Wemby won't show off the dribble pop in his career. Of course he will. I expect him to get better over the years. But many super tall guys, including Kevin Durant, have had this problem over the years where like dribbling against active defenders or dribbling through traffic with the ball is just harder to do because the ball has to travel so much further from the ground up to your hand every time. And because they're thin, they're more susceptible to physicality. And so that's a big part of why KD is such a quick, decisive attacker and why KD attacks off of so many off ball screens and why he likes to attack at a triple threat. Often those are situations that make it easier for KD to protect the ball. I again, I know that Wemby will get better as an off the dribble player, but to me his ability to like just sprint into jump shots both in transition and in the half court coming off of screening action, that to me is just an insane foundational offensive gift that should make him a very efficient scorer in this league for a long time. Now let's take a look at the on ball stuff kind of continues to fall into the realm of what I was just talking about between the difference of like protecting the basketball with a live dribble or facing the defender versus protecting the basketball when your back is to the basket. So in ball screen situations he ran 136 ball screens, including passes, and generated 133 points. That's 0.98 points per possession, which is slightly above average. But interestingly enough, it came almost entirely down to his passing ability. Victor is a very natural read and react player. His turnover issues mostly come down to dribbling through traffic and physicality. He sees the floor very well. It's not like he doesn't see help defenders and is just throwing the ball away. It's a, it's a dribbling through traffic issue for him in terms of the turnovers, but he sees the floor really well. And in pick and roll, like when he Is running those inverted screens where guards are screening firm. He's very good at hitting the guards slipping out of the screen, which generated a lot of advantage sequences for the spurs last year. That paid off and it extends to everywhere on his rolls, on his drives. He's very good at hitting cutters along the baseline as helpers react to him out of the post. Very good at hitting three point shooters as well as cutters along the baseline. Has really good chemistry with Jeremy Sohan as a baseline cutter when he's on cuts rolls in post up situations. But his one on one stuff is a mixed bag because again, even shooting out of pick and roll like when he was on the ball in pick and roll and tried to do something himself rather than pass the ball, he got to 0.73 points per possession with a 20% turnover rate. Again that falls in line with dribbling the basketball in traffic, the ball being in front of him right in ISO. He got just 0.69 points per possession when shooting out of ISO. Just hard to dribble at his height in traffic. And he just. The other piece of that is he just isn't a very good off the dribble jump shooter yet. But that I think will come in time. I think the turnover issues to a certain extent will be something that he has to deal with throughout his career and he'll just have to become very diligent about the way that he looks to attack. But when he was able to put his back to the basket, he was really good. Even with turnovers, against physicality, even when you factored those in, he just shot so efficiently that he was still just a hyper efficient post up player. He personally shot 59% out of the post. One of the things that really helped over the tail end of the season is he just got really quick and decisive on the catch out of the post and he used fewer dribbles. If he had space, he would just catch and turn right over his right shoulder. Sometimes a simple right shoulder fade, sometimes a little one like fade away over his right shoulder. But he would just catch, turn, fire, catch, turn, fire. No waiting for the defense to react, no trying to make things overly complicated. If you got a small guy on his on his hip, he would just like kind of poor Zingis ask, just turn directly into him and go straight up and down. Rather than fading. If he took a dribble, he would just take one dribble bump and then go. Rather than dribbling too much, he got much better at that towards the tail end of the season. That is what allowed him to be 59% shooting out of the post. Including passes. He got 1.11 points per possession. Even with a high turnover rate out of the post. That's 69th percentile. So very, very efficient as a post player. His post passing is just super impressive. There's no way around it. He is very good at finding cutters. I mentioned that he has great chemistry with Steph Castle and Jeremy Sohan on cuts. He's very good at spraying out to three point shooters against double teams. Just awesome out of the post. The main areas that Wemby needs to improve on offense in order to become a bonafide top tier superstar. Couple of fundamental things, handling physicality without turning the ball over. Guys just get up in his business and attack the basketball because they know he's thin and they know he's upright. I think this will always be somewhat of an issue for him. Like it's still an issue for KD even at his age. Even as he has put on a little bit of strength and as he has become more comfortable playing in the WNBA or in the wnba. Sorry, we have a WNBA segment for a mailbag. So that has been in my head. But Katie's been in the NBA a long time and he's become comfortable. But he still deals with occasional turnover issues from his physicality. Right. But you can mitigate that by being very quick and decisive and using more protected sequences. So coming off of off ball action, for example, you're not going to turn the ball over there in the post. He can limit his turnovers there if he just continues to do what he did at the end of the season, which just being really quick and decisive off the catch, trying not to dribble too much through traffic, which is where things are going to go south. Secondly, he just needs to improve as an off the dribble shot maker. He's a very good movement shooter already. So the, the, the. The ability to shoot on the move is not an issue. He just needs to connect that dribbling to the shooting element. So it's like a fluidity piece that'll just come in time with lots of repetition. I expect Victor to get better at that. Then we mentioned earlier just the footwork piece of shooting out of pick and pop where he's like kind of shuffling and backpedaling more than sprinting into shots. Improving his shooting in that specific situation will help him a lot. The only real big picture thing I have my eye on with Wemby over the years is his ability to find a reliable go to move. He is relying pretty, pretty heavily right now on long distance jump shooting. So for example, 57% of Victor's shot attempts last year were at least 16ft away from the basket and he's actually trending further in that direction. As a rookie, that was only 41%. So he went from the majority of his shots being inside of 16ft to now the majority of his shots being outside of 16ft. It's important to mention that he was efficient here because he shot 40% on long twos and because he shot well enough from 3, he got 1.03 points per shot on all those long jump shots. That's fine. That's an if that's a reasonably efficient shot for him. But like we always talk about, there's a certain element of variance that comes in that type of long distance jump shooting on single possessions. Towards the end of games you want to have something reliable that you can go to that is a short range scoring move that is less susceptible to that variance. So for instance, last year Victor took just 49 jump shots inside of 17ft and he shot just 32.7% on them. He made just 10 hooks and floaters all year on just over 40%. It's basically not a part of his game right now. You want to know how Jokic made 50 clutch shots last year on 56% from the field? It wasn't all just bullying dudes to the rim. He also has a super reliable set of short range scoring moves, hooks, floaters and short jump shots. We talked about similar things with guards, guys like Kevin Durant, Jalen Brunson, Shay, Gilders, Alexander. That's what drives their reliability. At the end of games they can get to inside of 17ft and they can knock those shots down more than half the time. I've been critical of Luka over the last year for seemingly moving away from that part of his game after it carried him to a finals run in 2024. Wemby this season was 17 for 46 in the clutch, just 37%, just 5 for 21 on threes. Now there's variance with long distance shooting under any circumstance, but those shots, especially at the end of games, they just get incredibly hard to make consistently. You're exhausted, there's a ton of physicality. You're playing a truly locked in defense. Playing their hardest defense of the game, the refs are allowing more contact, they're swallowing their whistles. It's hard to shoot from the perimeter in those situations. Okay, so what does that look like for Wemby? What does the reliable bit of short range shot making look like for Wemby? To me, I think it's pretty clearly just that short fade away over his right shoulder, fighting for position in that 10 to 12ft away zone. Or if he's attacking with a live dribble, just getting into some contact in that 8 to 9 foot range and then pounding into a spin. But being able to shoot over that right shoulder with that little short like 13, 14 foot fade away. That's the kind of shot that I think he could easily get up over 50, 55% on. He's already pretty naturally good at that shot. He just needs to really increase the number of reps so that it becomes more reliable for him in that situation. From there he just needs a counter. If guys are going to overplay the right shoulder, he needs something he can do over his left shoulder, an easy one. There is just a left shoulder hook or a left shoulder fade. If he prefers to shoot jump shots in that situation. But getting something, a basic move, counter move sequence that he can use at the end of games out of the post, just turning and out of ISO, a hard drive to the right, wait for the guy to cut him off, just pound into that spin over his right shoulder. Those are the types of moves that I think will become really dependable for him over the years. What I don't want to see is Wemby go the Tatum route of over indexing towards large sample efficiency. The analytics guys love that stuff. You put up some sick ass basketball reference numbers when you do that sort of thing. But those guys have a tendency to go insanely cold in big spots. Kind of like Tatum did in game one and two of the Knicks series. Tatum went cold, team blew the series as a result like that. You can't have your best player going that frosty cold in such a big moment. But when you rely so heavily on tough off the dribble three point shooting, it just becomes really difficult to have game to game consistency. You're susceptible to that sort of thing. There is a place for that sort of thinking. Meaning the, the high volume three point shooting. I believe in the value of the three point shot. I'm not an idiot. I also think taking them a lot to help boost efficiency is smart. It just can't come at the expense of a well rounded approach to skill development. And you definitely need to sacrifice a certain number of possessions and each year, game to game, so that you can maintain some short range scoring rhythm, especially right now when Victor's not particularly good at it, he's got to get good at it and that's going to come through repetition. And so I would be willing to sacrifice a certain number of possessions, you know, three, four times a game where Victor's going to that little right shoulder fade away, maybe even a little bit more so that he can get really reliable with it, so that he can lean on it more at the tail end of games. We talked about Wemby shot blocking earlier, but I just want to go a touch deeper on how incredibly gifted Victor Wembanyama is as a defender. As I mentioned in the Anthony Davis video last week, I think Wemby is far and away the best defender in the world at this point. Victor made a bad defensive roster look like a good defense when he was on the floor last year. The spurs played 4,750 possessions with Victor Wembanyama off the floor according to Cleaning the Glass last year, and they posted a 122 defensive rating in those possessions. For perspective, the Utah Jazz posted the worst defensive rating in the league last year at 119.4. Take that same group of defensive talent, add Victor Womenyama 3,141 possessions, a 112.4 defensive rating. For perspective, the Pistons ranked 10th in defense last year at 112.55. So in other words, Victor Wyama's defensive talent is enough to take effectively the worst defense in the NBA and turn it into a top 10 defense. The scheme versatility is off the charts. He can defend in any pick and roll coverage. Like he's insanely good as a drop coverage big, but he can also come up to the level and bother pull up shooters. His ISO numbers were a little tricky because of his issues with bigs which we'll get into in a minute. But guards in pick and roll and switches. He did very well on he's insanely good as an off ball helper. Like you'll just see these highlights where a guy gets blocked at the rim and he didn't even know Victor was in the play. Just he just can shock people with his ability to cover ground any race mistakes from his teammates. And again like if you look at the ISO numbers there are examples of like Anthony Davis overpowering him, Jaren Jackson overpowering him. Jokic obviously had some success against him one on one. But overall even with those guys, like there's random possessions in regular season games where those dudes just drop their shoulder and just went right through Victor Weyama. But then he'll lock in at the tail end of a game and get really physical and his length just becomes such a factor that I still think he's pretty good at defending those guys in a big spot anyway, even with the giving up all the weight. Like there was a game against Denver last year, the one where they won in Denver where Jokic was given, we'd be a lot of issues, get a lot of deep seals getting a lot of layups, but then two possessions at the tail end of the game on the right block he played phenomenal defense. One where he absorbed the contact well, stayed in front and forced Jokic into an incredibly difficult hook shot that Jokic made because he's fucking crazy good. And then the next possession they went right back to Yokic on the right block and Wemby smothered him so bad that Jokic just threw the ball away. And the next thing you know, Devin Vassell was icing the game with a dunk at the buzzer on the other end of the floor. Like even with those one on one situations where he's had some issues. I like if there's a five minute stretch at the tail end of a game where Victor needs to guard Jaren Jackson this year, I think he's going to figure out Jaren Jackson. You know, he's just, he's skinny and there were times where it was almost like he got caught off guard as one of those dudes just like I'm plowing through you right now. And and so yeah, his ISO numbers weren't great statistically this year, but overall he defended guards extremely well in switches. He defended well in every coverage. He defended as an off ball defender extremely well. Even if you factor all that stuff in his overall, like even if we want to get nitpicky, his overall total impact as a defensive weapon is far and away the best in the league to me. So it feels lame to even focus on that specific element of it. He gets shoved around sometimes and he'll still break your offense and that's ultimately what sets him apart. And just wait until they actually surround him with some competent defensive players. That's when you're really going to see a crazy level of defense out of Victor Wembanyama and the Spurs. I'm not super high on the spurs this year. I don't think they have very much talent on their roster compared to the other top NBA teams. They are a really poor off ball shooting team and they don't have enough defensive talent to be reliably great on that end. Night to night. I think there'll be a play in team this year, but I am super high on Victor Wembanyama, and I think he has the potential to explode onto the superstar scene this year. It comes in at number seven in this year's player rankings. All right, before we get out of here today, Patrick Beverley said, quote, hi.
- [42:19]
Buzz Knight
I'm Buzz Knight, the host of the Taking a Walk podcast. And join me for an upcoming episode with Zach McFarlane, the creator of Family Guy, talking about his new Frank Sinatra music project.
- [42:30]
Seth MacFarlane
Anyone who loves music would salivate over something like this. The biggest question for us was, what's in these boxes? There were a few unplayed gems that we had been alerted to by Charlie Pinion of Sinatra Enterprises. So we knew that certain songs like Shadow of your smile, which actually is not on this record, it'll be on the next one.
- [42:50]
Buzz Knight
Seth McFarland.
- [42:51]
Seth MacFarlane
Don Rickles went up to Frank Sinatra and he said, listen, I'm going to be having dinner with this lovely woman, and I, you know, would you come over and say hi? And just so you know, because I feel like if she sees that I know you, it's going to make me look really cool and, you know, I might have a good night. During the middle of dinner, Frank walks over and says, don, hi.
- [43:06]
Basketball Analyst (possibly Jason or unnamed host)
How are you?
- [43:06]
Seth MacFarlane
And Don goes, frank, please, I'm in the middle of dinner.
- [43:08]
Buzz Knight
Seth McFarland on the taking a walk podcast. Listen to Taking a walk on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
- [43:19]
Honey German
Hola, it's Honey German. And my podcast, gracias, Come again is back. This season, we're going even deeper into the world of music and entertainment with raw and honest conversations with some of your favorite Latin artists and celebrities. You didn't have to audition.
- [43:32]
Will Lucas
No, I didn't audition. I have an audition in Nicoba 25 years.
- [43:36]
Honey German
Oh, wow. That's a real G talk right there.
- [43:38]
Basketball Analyst (possibly Jason or unnamed host)
Oh, yeah.
- [43:39]
Honey German
We've got some of the biggest actors, musicians, content creators, and culture shifters sharing their real stories of failure and success. You were destined to be a star. We talk all about what's viral and trending with a little bit of cheeseme, a lot of laughs, and those amazing vivas you've come to expect. And of course, we'll explore deeper topics dealing with identity and struggles and all the issues affecting our Latin community. You feel like you get a little whitewashed because you have to do the code switching.
- [44:09]
Will Lucas
I won't say whitewashed, because at the.
- [44:11]
Basketball Analyst (possibly Jason or unnamed host)
End of the day, you know, I'M me.
- [44:12]
Will Lucas
Yeah, but the whole pretending and coat, you know, it takes a toll on you.
- [44:16]
Honey German
Listen to the new season of Gracias. Come again as part of my Cultura Podcast Network on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcast or wherever you get your podcast.
- [44:25]
Dr. Leah Tritate
Sometimes it's hard to remember, but going.
- [44:27]
Basketball Analyst (possibly Jason or unnamed host)
Through something like that is a traumatic experience. But it's also not the end of your life.
- [44:33]
Dr. Leah Tritate
That was my dad reminding me and so many others who need to hear it that our trauma is not our shame to carry and that we have big, bold and beautiful lives to live after what happened to us. I'm your host and co president of this organization, Dr. Lea Tritate. On my new podcast, the Unwanted Sorority, we wade through transformation to peel back healing and reveal what it actually looks like and sounds like in real time. Each week I sit down with people who've lived through harm, carried silence, and are now reshaping the systems that failed us. We're going to talk about the adultification of black girls mothering as resistance and the tools we use for healing. The Unwanted Sorority is a safe space, not a quiet space. So let's lock in. We're moving towards liberation together. Listen to the Unwanted Sorority. New episodes every Thursday on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
- [45:27]
Dani Shapiro
Your entire identity has been fabricated. Your beloved brother goes missing without a trace. You discover the depths of your mother's illness, the way it has echoed and reverberated throughout your life, impacting your very legacy. Hi, I'm Dani Shapiro and these are just a few of the profound and powerful stories I'll be mining on our 12th season of Family Secrets. With over 37 million downloads, we continue to be moved and inspired by our guests and their courageously told stories. I can't wait to share 10 powerful new episodes with you. Stories of tangled up identities, concealed truths, and the way in which family Secrets almost always need to be told. I hope you'll join me and my extraordinary guests for this new season of Family Secrets. Listen to Family Secrets Season 12 on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
- [46:30]
Basketball Analyst (possibly Jason or unnamed host)
If you put Paul George in that role as Klay Thompson, playing with Steph Draymond Green and Iguodala, I think that Golden State probably wins more championships. I completely disagree with this and I don't mean it as an attempt to say that Clay was a better basketball player than Paul George at his peak. I don't think you can make that case. Paul George once finished third In MVP voting, he has three times as many all NBA selections, including a first team all NBA selection. But specifically, when you look at Klay Thompson's role on the warriors and what they specifically needed from him, I thought Clay was every bit as impactful in that role as Paul George could have been. Possibly even more so. For starters, Klay Thompson is one of the most underrated defenders of all time. He only has one all defense selection. In 2019. He made second team. But for the entirety of his prime with the warriors, he was an excellent perimeter defender. He has great size and strength for position. He can guard up and down. He could guard Kyrie Irving well, but he could also guard big forwards well as well. He has good lateral quickness, can slide his feet, excellent instincts. This is the big thing that sets him apart. He was just always really good at anticipating which ways guys would go and then beating them to spots, getting good contests, taking contact, just getting a good contest. Like I thought the Jaylen Brown series in 2022 was a great example of this. Like this was after his ACL and Achilles injuries, he struggled early in the series. So much so that they briefly switched Draymond Green onto Jaylen Brown. But towards the tail end of the series, especially in game four and in Game five, Clay guarded Jalen Brown phenomenally well and was just starting to anticipate his moves and was beating him to spots and taking that contact in the chest. Like I think Clay is like, don't get me wrong, Paul George, probably at his peak, was a better defender than Clay, but that gap is much closer than we think. And I don't think Paul George could have done much better for the Golden State defense in the specific role than Clay did over those years. And then on offense again, it's important to look at what they needed out of that role alongside Steph. Yes, Paul George in his prime certainly would have been a much better lead option to run an offense than Klay Thompson. But it's important to acknowledge, first of all, even then, Paul was probably still not good enough to do it at a championship level. And we're discussing it in the role of playing alongside Steph. The warriors offense was all about read and react basketball. Quick decision making, very little dribbling, playing with an advantage. When Steph was off the floor, Clay was able to provide a reasonable facsimile of what Steph did as an off ball shooting gravitational force so that the warriors could run the same offense and essentially kind of keep some continuity there. And he was an absolute monster on the floor. Alongside Steph, benefiting from his gravity, bringing much of his own kind of a counterbalance effect like in that role is so important. I mean, look at the job that we've seen. Guys like when, like when Buddy Healed played well last year, like on the nights that Buddy Healed play well, they looked like old warriors teams. It was Buddy he inconsistency that ended up being a problem. Right. But Clay Thompson brought that pretty consistently every night during that era and that was what allowed that warriors offense to reach the level that they did. Clay wasn't as good as Steph, but his shooting ability was immensely valuable to that Golden State team. Now, could Paul George have won a title with Steph? Sure. But I just push back on the idea that they somehow would have been better or that they would have won more. That's just not how basketball works. It's so much more complicated than that. Your value as a player is unique to your role, unique to what the team needs out of you. I actually found this concept generally within modern team building to be very interesting. We've talked about it with Luca and the idea like essentially that when you have a supreme offensive engine, you don't need to track down another top tier superstar to push you over the top. When you have a supreme offensive engine, the game is so easy that you can rely on just a really, really good star and then really high level role player talent around them. Right? Like LeBron James with Kyrie Irving for example, or Steph Curry with Klay Thompson, Nicola Jokic with Jamal Murray. Luka Doncic hasn't won a title yet, but he got close with Kyrie. Right. I do believe that Luka could win one without a superstar teammate. They certainly need to be surrounded by talent. I'm not trying to say you don't need talent, but you, you open yourself up to being able to surround those guys with really high level role players. Because those offensive initiators generate such insane advantages that even high level role players can fill a real role on offense. Like Draymond Green's role on offense was unlocked by Steph's shooting gravity. It's what made that work. The guys like Luka and LeBron, there are not a lot of teams where you can just surround one guy with a bunch of shooters in the offense is great. It worked with those guys because they were setting those guys up with such high quality three point shots and because they were able to absorb so much usage. And again, Luca hasn't done it at a championship level yet, but I believe he eventually will in Lebron did, right. They need some support, right? Steph doesn't win the title without Klay Thompson. LeBron James doesn't win the title without Kyrie Irving. Luca, Don, excuse me, Nicole Jokic doesn't win the title without Jamal Murray. But those are guys that are like clearly off of that superstar tier that are really good at one thing. For Klay Thompson, it's nuclear. Shooting is probably the second best shooter of all time. And with Kyrie Irving and Jamal Murray, it's that just bucket getting. It's the random possession here or there where you just need that guy to create a great shot. Having these elite offensive engines gives you the ability to build a roster that is open to more of that depth of role player talent and less dependent on superstar support. You give those guys a legit superstar and they're just going to win easy, right? Like Steph got KD, he won two easy ones. LeBron had Anthony Davis as a top five player one season. After that year, AD declined pretty quickly into that like second tier of stars. But when LeBron had AD as a top five player, that was the easiest title he won. No one threatened that team in 2020 because you had two players at that level. If you gave Jokic, Shay, Gilders, Alexander, they're winning the title this year easy. But those guys don't need that. They are capable of winning with really high level role player talent because of their ability to generate such easy offense for their teams. I just think, like, I just think Pat's comments are both a lack of understanding of what made the warriors great, which started with Steph creating easy roles for everyone. And then I think it undersells what Clay did there. His ability to impact games kind of at the level of that of a superstar in his role. Some of the craziest moments in warriors history were off the fingers of Klay Thompson when he would just get blazing hot or when he would sit down in a stance and play incredible on ball defense against a star on the other team. And I just think he deserves more credit for what he accomplished there. All right guys, that's all I have for today. As always, I sincerely appreciate you guys for supporting me and supporting the show. We will be back on Friday with our mail back. I will see you guys then.
- [54:07]
Buzz Knight
Hi, I'm Buzz Knight, the host of the Taking a Walk podcast. And join me for an upcoming episode with Seth McFarlane, the creator, a family guy, talking about his new Frank Sinatra music project.
- [54:19]
Seth MacFarlane
Anyone who loves music would salivate over something like this. The biggest question for us was what's in these boxes. Really, the most thrilling part was hiring an orchestra and just playing what was in these boxes.
- [54:31]
Buzz Knight
Listen to Taking a walk on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.
- [54:37]
Sarah Spain
Get fired up, y'. All. Season 2 of Good Game with Sarah Spain is underway. We just welcomed one of my favorite people, an incomparable soccer icon Megan Rapinoe, to the show and we had a blast. Take a listen. Sue and I were like riding the lime bikes the other day and we're.
- [54:54]
Basketball Analyst (possibly Jason or unnamed host)
Like, wee like, this is.
- [54:56]
Sarah Spain
People ride bikes because it's fun. We got more incredible guests like Megan in store, plus news of the day and more. So make sure you listen to Good Game with Sarah Spain on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. Brought to you by Novartis, founding partner of iHeart Women's Sports Network.
- [55:14]
Will Lucas
It's Black Business Month and black tech green money is tapping in. I'm Will Lucas, spotlighting black founders, investors and innovators building the future one idea at a time. Let's talk legacy tech and generational wealth.
- [55:27]
Basketball Analyst (possibly Jason or unnamed host)
I had the skill and I had the talent. I didn't have the opportunity. Yeah, we all know, right? Genius is evenly distributed.
- [55:35]
Sarah Spain
Opportunity is not.
- [55:37]
Will Lucas
To hear this and more on the power of black innovation and ownership, listen to Black tech green Money from the Black Effect Podcast Network on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
- [55:48]
Basketball Analyst (possibly Jason or unnamed host)
I'm Jay Kofer and this is back 40, a limited series show on Wire to Hunt, part of Meat Eaters Podcast Network. Each episode I'll be asking eight whitetail hunting pros a focused, thought provoking question about hunting and land management. How do I hunt the best part of the farm with less than ideal access? Should you? That's what the real question is. Stand without good access is not a good stand. Listen to Back 40 on iHeartRadio app, Apple podcast or wherever you get your podcast. This is an iHeart podcast.