Wemby Watch: Boston Brushes off Spurs, Victor Doesn’t Box Out

Story of the Game

If the Spurs don’t have anybody who can teach Victor on how to box out, I’ll do it.

If the Spurs don’t have anybody who can tell Jeremy Sochan to stop doing stupid stuff, I’ll do it.

If the Spurs don’t have anybody who can coach players like Devin Vassell to look up and pass the ball to the 7'4 guy when he’s open for an alley oop, I’ll do it.

As I watched the first half of the Spurs 40th basketball game of the 2023–2024 season, I started to wonder what Pop even does.

If they’re not winning and they’re still making 10th grade basketball mistakes, what is the gray beard on the sideline actually doing?

Victor Stats

27 points, 1 assists, 5 rebounds, 1 blocks in 27 minutes

10–19 fgs, 2–6 3 fgs

Quick Thoughts

Despite the 27 points in 27 minutes, this was one of Victor’s worst performances. A decent chunk of credit must go to the Celtics for playing him the right way.

Basically that means pack the paint, be physical, and tempt Victor to shoot threes.

Threes are starting to have a negative association when it comes to Victor because it means the defense has won. First, Victor only shoots threes at a 29.2% clip. Second, if Victor’s shooting threes, he’s not leveraging his advantage inside. Third, if Victor is shooting a three, it usually isn’t a result of the offense flowing.

Also, one theme that is not going away is Victor boxes absolutely nobody out. In fact, he willingly lets opponents have inside position and then tries to rely on his height to bail him out.

This is a bad, bad habit.

It’s surprising that the Spurs basketball organization can’t afford for anybody to help him with this.

One hedge here is to pair Victor with a stronger big man who can take more of the rebounding load (and other responsibilities). The Spurs don’t currently have such a player who is capable of filling this role, but it could be a helpful pairing at times.

It’s too bad Charles Bassey got injured, he would have been interesting to watch alongside Victor.

Another problematic pattern I noticed coming through against the Celtics was Victor playing timid and weak at times.

One example was when he caught the ball with his back to the hoop and threw it up in one motion without looking at the basket. Why are you in such a hurry, Victor?

It’s your court. It’s your post position. You don’t have to hurry your shot — you’re the dominant one. If you don’t have a clean shot, come down with the ball, establish your footing, and go right back up.

Also, I noticed a few possessions where Victor was bringing his shots down to defenders. He’ll contort his body and/or move his arms out horizontally rather than vertically.

Victor should never have trouble getting his shot off but a few times against the C’s, he put himself in trouble.

I have “go to the sky” in my notes. I’d like to see Victor extend vertically and do so closer to the basket.

Oh, I almost forgot, Victor also needs to be better on when to pick his spots to bring the ball up the floor. Most of the time, he shouldn’t.

P.P.S. I thought I saw Victor palm the ball this game (I might have imagined it but it looked like he did), but I also saw more evidence that lent credibility to my grip strength theory.

Pay attention to when Victor goes to the basket out of control or the ball doesn’t come out of his hand right. There was one play early on where he had a complete garbage scoop shot and there was also a turnaround left hook-push shot over his right shoulder (nearest the baseline) that hit the top of the backboard.

Jeremy Sochan plays a very stupid brand of basketball.

Why are you fighting Victor over a rebound? Just let him have it.

Also, how many times are you going to drive into the paint without a plan B when you ultimately get stuck?

Jeremy is like when you go to Colorado to pan for gold and you know there’s gold in the mountains, but you also know it’s going to be hard to extract enough gold for it to be worth the effort.

If we could take out 75% of the bad, Jeremy is a very capable player — his three pointer continues to be better than you’d think (37.5%) and he possesses real talent.

I would try to mold him as a mix between Bruce Bowen and Dennis Rodman. I’d have him focus on three things:

• One-on-one defense
• Hitting corner threes
• Rebounding

And throw in a side of mind games if he’s up for it, which it looks like he is.

Physically, he really, really reminds me of Dennis Rodman.

• He’s about the same height.
• He moves in similar ways.
• He dyes his hair.
• He sometimes has this disillusioned look.

And to top it all off, he wears #10.

At the end of the half, the Spurs found themselves down 25 points. That’s not the 35 points it was vs. the Hawks, but that’s still a very large deficit in just 24 minutes of basketball.

Of course, these early deficits make it almost impossible to win the game.

The Spurs battled back (to a degree) admirably in the second half, but you’re not going to beat good teams when you’re losing by 25 after two quarters.

Gregg Popovich might deserve some blame here.

Might as in definitely does.

Pre-game Setup

The Celtics-Spurs matchup is game #40 for the Spurs.

Betting: Boston -16, Over/Under 237.5

(Guess-Prediction: I’ll take the Spurs and the over.)

Betting Record going into the game 24–25–1.

The Spurs are in Boston for this contest.