Rival teams believe they’ve finally cracked the code to neutralizing San Antonio's phenom by dragging him away from the paint, but the box scores tell a different story.
It's a provocative idea, I will give 'em that.
Victor Wembanyama is fresh off leading his San Antonio Spurs to the NBA Finals in just his third season. The French phenom is just 22 years old, and despite being 7-4, doesn't have his head in the clouds.
He's a clear thinker. An incredible talent. Maybe already the game's best player.
But the "secret'' on how to stop him is out!
Or something.
The New York Knicks downed the Spurs in those aforementioned Finals in part because they “laid the blueprint on how to attack him,” an "anonymous scout'' tells a national publication.
That "secret''?
“Draw him out to the corner,” the scout said, adding that the Knicks "really tired him out by just moving him around, attacking him. ... I thought they did a good job of wearing him out.”
That's it? That's the information that would cause a "scout'' to demand to be "anonymous''?
There is nothing inventive or secretive about the idea of drawing a 7-4 defender away from the basket, or about the idea of forcing a big man to move and to get leaned on in order to "wear him out.''
That's one problem with this "blockbuster report.''
And here's the other one ...
The Knicks did all of these things. And they won, fair and square. At the same time, against New York, he still averaged 26 points, 11.2 rebounds and 3.2 blocks per game over the course of the Finals. ... essentially doing all of the same things he did over the course of the regular season when he was the unanimous Defensive Player of the Year while also finishing third in MVP voting.
Oh, and during that 2025-26 season, some nagging injuries caused him to sometimes be on a minutes limit.
Here's my "inside secret'' - though I am not a scout ...
Wemby is likely to exceed his numbers from a year ago, will again be an MVP finalist, and will again set his team up for true contention toward a repeat appearance in the NBA Finals.
And one more, though this is just a guess: As a "character guy,'' I bet he'll add some psychological motivation to his approach this season, a "revenge tour,'' as it's been phrased.
In the end, the "anonymous scout'' seems to be shrugging his shoulders at his own offered solution.
“Wembanyama is going to have a monster regular season,” the scout said. “If the Spurs take the minutes restrictions off, he’s going to put up some ridiculous numbers. We can assume that he's a little stronger and healthier, and will get a bump just from that.”
Yup. In other words, the real "secret'' is out. And it's not really a "secret'' at all.
