Even though 19-year-old Victor Wembanyama isn’t even eligible to play in the NBA yet, he’s already got NBA executives wishing they could have him on their team.
The 7-foot-5 basketball phenom has the length of a center and the skillset of a guard. He will undoubtedly be the No. 1 overall pick in the upcoming 2023 NFL Draft later this year and one anonymous Western Conference executive is already saying what some of his colleagues are undoubtedly thinking: we should have tanked.
“Honestly, I wish we wouldn’t have won so many games this year,” the Western Conference executive said according to Jonathan Givony of ESPN. “We’re going to all regret not tanking every game to get this dude.”
The executive’s honest words came in response to an absolutely insane play from Victor Wembanyama against a EuroLeague team in which he missed a stepback three-point attempt but scored his own putback dunk on the rebound.
“The craziest thing to me is how effortless this looked for him — we’re talking about putting back your own miss off a step-back 3. … Who even thinks about that?” the Western Conference executive said. “I was mesmerized just by the way he was handling the ball against a 5-11 guy and how fluidly he got into this step back. I certainly wasn’t prepared for what happened next. … He didn’t even really have control of the ball, but his hands are so big he just guided the putback through the rim. From a biomechanics standpoint, that should all be impossible. We haven’t even talked about the way he mapped out the court in real time instantaneously to even give himself a chance to put himself in position to make that play. The whole thing is unreal, and scary.”
In less than a year, fans will be able to watch him do that in NBA games.
[ESPN]
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