So you won the rights to Victor Wembanyama. Now what?
History shows that prospects of this caliber don't take long to reach the upper echelon of the league. So skip the long rebuild and add talent immediately.
Good morning. Let’s basketball.
Woman in the Garden; Claude Monet; 1867
On Tuesday night, one lucky NBA team will win the rights to draft French wunderkind Victor Wembanyama No. 1 overall. You know this is a huge deal; Wembanyama might be the most desired NBA prospect since LeBron James. ESPN did a big 10-minute feature on him last week. Brian Windhorst and Jonathan Givony wrote a long companion piece. This is like a future NFL star quarterback level of attention.
The dude is 7’2 and grew up doing Pete Maravich dribbling drills and idolizes Kevin Durant. Created in a lab to be absolutely beloved by millions of global basketball fans.
By now you probably know the odds of him landing with various clubs. In case you don’t:
The Pistons, Rockets and Spurs have the best chances (14% each)
The Hornets, Blazers and Magic follow (9-12.5%)
Then come the Pacers, Wizards and Jazz (4.5-6.8%)
Then come the Mavericks (3%)
And finally there’s a slim chance the pick goes to the Bulls, Thunder, Raptors and Pelicans (0.5-1.8%)
There is no chance that the team that wins the No. 1 overall pick will trade it. Based on no inside knowledge, just my sense of the valuations here, I think the list of veteran NBA stars that teams would trade Wembanyama for is probably shorter than a half-dozen names. It’s not happening. The team that wins the pick on Tuesday night will have Wembanyama in their uniform for 4-7 years minimum.
And that’s what is interesting to me. If you win the rights to Wembanyama tonight, what comes next?
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