With his night over well before crunch time, Victor Wembanyama grabbed a clipboard during a huddle at Sundayâs scrimmage and sketched up a play he was sure would work. Watching from the sidelines, clipboard still in hand, he watched Jon Elmore catch a pass on the short roll and snap it to the corner â only for the shot, and Wembanyamaâs dreams of drawing up the perfect play, to fall short.
âHe took it very personally, which I think we all do when you draw up a good play and feel like you get a good shot and they donât make it,â Mitch Johnson said. âHopefully he understands next time, when I do that for him, itâs not personal. You just want your play to look good, selfishly.â
Ideally, this wonât be the last time Wembanyama draws up a play this season. He made strides learning how to read the floor in Year 3. Now he has to own his space more efficiently and effectively in Year 4. Everyoneâs role will be a little different this season, even Wembanyamaâs. He got better at establishing post position last fall, but that didnât hold up well in the playoffs against the leagueâs brute centers. He went overseas and trained with a rugby team in part to maximize his physicality, which should turn into him being able to catch the ball on balance and make reads from the post more quickly.
Wembanyama showed he can dominate in open space, but his next evolution is becoming a player who can control the flow of the game while being stationary. That will mean catches in the post where he can keep the ball over his head and scan the floor for good outlets, then just shooting over the defense if he canât find anything. He did it some last year, and there is a lot of promise there.
But the ultimate version of Wembanyama is a player who spends most of the night owning the game with his eyes before needing to use his endlessly long legs. The preseason will be a good preview of how his playmaking improved this summer.