Victor Wembanyama is to make a leap this season and, to quote him after winning silver in the Paris Olympics, “I’m learning, and I’m worried for the opponents in a couple of years.”
Maybe a few specific, well-known opponents in particular. Speaking to CBS Sports’ Ashley Niclole Moss Wembanyama laid out the three players he most would like to dunk on.
“The best defenders would be the biggest challenge, so that would be Rudy Gobert, I think Kawhi [Leonard] would be, because all these guys I respect so much on the defensive end that it would be incredible to dunk on them. So I’d say Rudy, Kawhi and a third one would be Jonathan Isaac. I think [Isaac’s] a really, really underrated defender.”
There’s a lot of players around the NBA who would like to dunk on Gobert, but for Wembanyama it’s not personal animosity but a friendly rivalry with his fellow Frenchman. That rivalry could include Wembanyama taking the Defensive Player of the Year award away from Gobert this season.
Fans across the league know what kind of defender Kawhi Leonard still is to this day, but Wembanyama is right that a lot of them don’t know that the Orlando Magic’s Isaac is a First Team All-Defense level player (he’ll earn honors if he can stay healthy for 65 games in a season).
Wembanyama may want those three, but a lot of other players are going to be his victim on the path to that. Wembanyama is going to be in a lot of posters this season, and the Spurs are going to be an entertaining team to watch with Chris Paul feeding him the rock this season.
