Four years ago, Nicolas Batum – a player with 12 years of experience in the NBA and currently playing for the Los Angeles Clippers – walked out of a training session with the French men’s basketball national team when a tall, skinny boy caught his attention and stopped him from leaving.
The fourteen-year-old amazed Batum because, despite his immense height and endless arms, he moved with extreme grace on the court, with a complete offensive game, blocking shots and dunking effortlessly. So much so that, while it is usually children who approach NBA players, in this case, the NBA veteran introduced himself to this boy named Victor Wembanyama.
He saw this fourteen-year-old boy and decided to call his former national teammate Tony Parker, a future NBA Hall of Famer and current president of the ASVEL club in the French first division, telling him: “We need to get this guy, Victor Wembanyama.” Today, the entire NBA says it needs to get this guy, Victor Wembanyama, who is now 223 cm tall with a wingspan of 240 cm and is a generational talent expected to be the undisputed first overall pick in the 2023 NBA draft. According to some NBA analysts, the young Frenchman is considered one of the most enticing basketball prospects ever and the kind of talent that would contend for the first overall pick in any draft in the league’s history.
Although he only recently went viral following some spectacular plays, Wembanyama has already spent three professional seasons in France with the clubs Nanterre 92 and ASVEL and was named the Pro A’s best young player both in 2021 and 2022. Mike Schmitz, a draft expert for ESPN and one of the most listened-to voices in the field, calls him the true prize of next year’s draft class, the “best prospect in the world regardless of age,” and a future NBA MVP, provided he manages to stay healthy.
While he won’t play any NBA games this season, his presence will loom over the league all year. For the first time in history, the NBA will stream all games of a European team, the Metropolitans 92, during the 2022-23 season on its new NBA App to showcase this young talent and continue building the hype around him. The debut took place on October 29, when his team, the Metropolitans 92, played against JL Bourg Basket, where the young prospect once again demonstrated his remarkable talent.
NBA teams have been planning for his arrival in the league for years, and now his pre-draft season has finally come. Adding to this is the fact that the 2023 NBA Draft also includes another potential future superstar, G League Ignite point guard Scoot Henderson, giving the impression that there are two talents worthy of being the number 1 pick in this year’s draft. This makes it a great year to be at the bottom of the standings. In October, the NBA organized two exhibition games between Wembanyama’s team and the NBA’s G League Ignite team, featuring its star Scoot Henderson. The idea was to showcase the top two prospects in the next draft, and the result exceeded expectations.
Wembanyama was spectacular, scoring 73 points, grabbing 15 rebounds, blocking 9 shots, and making 9 of 18 three-point attempts (and 22 of 44 overall) in two games against one of the most talent-rich young teams in the world. Steph Curry had to turn to video games to describe him: “He looks like the player you create in NBA 2K, one of those with all the cheats.” What amazes everyone is that players of his height usually struggle with movement and/or shooting, whereas Wembanyama moves like a player 20 or 30 centimeters shorter and uses that innate mobility to dominate on both ends of the court.
Furthermore, perhaps the most surprising aspect for observers is Victor Wembanyama’s serious approach to stretching, flexibility, and activation sessions, which should provide reassurance regarding his ability to avoid the catastrophic foot, back, and knee injuries that have historically plagued other giants of his stature. After working with Holger Geschwindner, Dirk Nowitzki’s longtime coach, Wembanyama was encouraged to avoid a heavy weightlifting routine and let his frame develop naturally, offering NBA teams and their army of performance and sports science experts a nearly blank slate to work with. This can only be seen as a positive sign for the future, especially for a player with such a unique physique.
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, who was still named Lew Alcindor in college, forced the NCAA to ban dunking due to his dominance in order to make games fairer. Now, Wembanyama will not bring about such a revolutionary rule change, but in a sense, he has already changed the game just by being there. An NBA executive told Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN that this year will see the most ferocious tanking in NBA history.
Tanking is not new, especially to NBA insiders, for whom the Philadelphia 76ers’ “The Process” has been a prime example of extreme tanking in recent years. This strategy, if it can be called that, involves deliberately losing to increase a franchise’s chances of winning the draft lottery. What sets the 2023 draft apart is the Wembanyama factor. Instead of being limited to a handful of teams, this year’s “tankathon” could extend to about half the league, so great is the excitement surrounding the young Frenchman.
It is extremely rare for NBA teams to have more than an entire season to effectively maneuver their roster and position themselves for the draft lottery. Often, height develops before talent, and in Wembanyama’s case, it seems he has both.
The precedents for this year’s draft can be found 20 years ago, during LeBron James’ draft year. Dubbed “The Chosen One” by Sports Illustrated when he was a 17-year-old prospect out of St. Vincent-St. Mary High School, teams scrambled to secure the number one pick. Before him, there was Shaquille O’Neal’s draft (1992) and, of course, Magic Johnson and Larry Bird’s draft in 1979, perhaps the most similar to this upcoming 2023 draft.
The NBA is a competitive league and does an excellent job of redistributing wealth, both financially and talent-wise, but this is Wembanyama’s year. Ahead of the 2022-23 season, of the approximately 15 teams interested in lottery odds for the draft, only 9-10 will have a realistic chance of hitting the jackpot. Among these, they can further be divided into serious tankers and less serious ones. Those whose path is already set and those in “wait-and-see” mode.
Purists may oppose the blatant abandonment of the unwritten rule to be as competitive as possible in professional sports. However, this is Wembanyama’s and Scoot Henderson’s year, and for at least one year, the veil of competitive pretense will be lifted, creating some fascinating stories along the way. Despite the new draft lottery rules adopted specifically to discourage extreme tanking, it’s safe to bet that franchises will find ways to try to land the young Frenchman.
As if the advantage of controlling a truly unprecedented prospect for about a decade weren’t enough, the real prize for whoever drafts Wembanyama will come off the court, with significant benefits such as increased media exposure, more nationally televised games, and skyrocketing franchise value. An anonymous GM confided to reporter Wojnarowski that the mere possibility of drafting the 18-year-old French phenomenon is worth $500 million.
In light of this, NBA Commissioner Adam Silver did not take long to understand the prevailing winds, and every time he has spoken about Wembanyama after those two games, he has made it clear that rampant tanking will not be tolerated and that league officials are keeping a close eye on all situations within their extreme limits.
It is therefore clear that Victor Wembanyama, an 18-year-old with unprecedented prospects, will influence the fate of the NBA season more than many established stars, without ever having stepped foot on an NBA court yet.
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