Christmas Marquee: Wemby Big, But Mikal Bridges Sets Garden on Fire

The Knicks mortgaging away their future for Mikal Bridges certainly looked like a good call on this Christmas day. Bridges almost made every shot he took, enabling the Knicks to skirt away with a win in the NBA’s featured game of the season.

First of all, great call by the NBA making Spurs at Knicks their Christmas specatular opener. They put Wemby in the Garden on the biggest day of the year and it worked like a charm.

The New “Michael Jordan”

Victor clearly has everything needed to be the next “Michael Jordan of the league.” He showed up with the lights at 100% brightness: Victor scored 42 points on 16–31 shooting, capturing a nice array of highlight buckets along the way.

But I think he got tired at the end. He ended up playing 40 minutes and that may have led to more arm and less leg on some of his final three point attempts.

I like Mitch Johnson logging him major minutes — and the Spurs needed every ounce of Wemby because things went south quick when he exited — but we may have seen some slight fatigue in the 4th as Victor’s points dried up quickly.

Victor’s Threes

Victor finished 6–16 from three which I’m not as mad about as I normally am when Victor chunks a million threes. Here’s the see-saw:

Is Victor even better from three now?

Yes, there’s no doubt he’s getting better and better; his percentage from beyond the arc is on the rise and the Spurs’ Wemby three point gimmick is looking more and more viable. This in turn is loosening up defenses and opening up the Spurs offense.

Basically, even though it’s still somewhat flawed basketball, it becomes less and less radical the more Victor ranges above 35%.

However, here’s where we need a Charles Barkley plain-and-simpleism:

“You live by the three, you die by the three.”

Notice how no one says, you live by the layup, you die by the layup.

Thus, I think a sneaky wrinkle to Victor’s game could be fading threes as his minutes goes up / fatigue sets in.

And for the record, he still needs to shoot less threes. There has to be an accommodating ratio for the Spurs transition into the new, ultra modern NBA game: maybe 70/30 or 65/35 split in favor of twos.

The Look

Did you see how glum and disappointed Victor was when the Spurs lost?

His Christmas cheer was vaporized when the Knicks were able to fumble out the clock. And I liked it.

It’s always a great sign when he takes these games to heart. We’ve seen him more lighthearted and friendly this season and it was nice to see him become more sullen. The more he gets back to loathing losses, the more the Spurs start pulling out close games against playoff teams.

Victor’s intensity is a needle-moving intangible. He hates losing with a burning passion and loves winning possibly even more.

This extreme disposition is contrarian in the NBA; something we haven’t seen since Magic-Bird, Jordan, etc. And it’s a real advantage for the Spurs.

Rebounds

Victor did his part with 18 rebounds, but the Knicks made some of other Spurs look bad by swooping in to steal boards the Spurs took for granted.

There were a few times where Spurs teammates were caught looking at one another while a New York Knick went and got the ball.

Game Notes

There were gifts everywhere and one for the Spurs was Jeremy Sochan hitting 3–3 from three. If Jeremy can hit threes at a respectable clip, that does wonders for the Spurs.

Tre Jones also gifted a really nice performance. Surprisingly, he was the Spur who had the most success guarding Jalen Brunson. I think it’s because he’s similar to Brunson in many ways so he knows him better.

I think Victor was shorted a block. 4 feels light.

Devin Vassell looks like his rhythm is off. He also reminded me that he’s very susceptible to travels because of how he goes so hard and then stops.

Wemby Watch: Behind The Scenes

I’ve been away from the Wemby Watch desk for several games. The ultra dramatic reason why is watching the games and composing these write-ups takes a lot of time.

Still, I’m not done. I like watching Victor Wembanyama take over the league and I already made a 2025 playoff prediction before the season and you can be damn sure I’m going to be here to soak up all of the glory when my massive over/under win total prediction ends up cashing.

P.S. Speaking of betting, I would have won Christmas cash this afternoon if betting were allowed in Texas. There was no way the Spurs were -10 underdogs (I just looked and this ended at -8.5 — I’d still have taken that).