Wemby Watch: Low IQ Spurs Don’t Know How to Use Victor on Offense, Lose to OKC Thunder

The ESPN broadcast, and in particular, Tim Legler, kept trying to make this out into a Chet Holmgren gets the better of Victor Wembanyama story, but if you watched this game, you knew the final stats had nothing to do with Chet vs. Victor.

First, Chet plays with an embarrassment of riches in terms of teammates while Victor is surrounded with almost no outside shooting (and is missing Devin Vassell). This enabled the Thunder to collapse on Victor on virtually every offensive possession.

But, second, the Spurs literally don’t know how to use Victor on offense. Incredibly, after an entire tanking season of “development,” Gregg Popovich has no idea to get him in positions to score. At multiple points in the second half, Victor was just standing in the corner on offense.

Yes, individually, Chet gets this round, but Chet just has a lot more space to work with. (And I’m not faulting Chet for it, but it’s not like this was a classic NBA on NBC head-to-head superstar battle.)

And the Thunder were expected to dominate this game as a -12.5 betting favorite, but Victor finishing at 1–5 with 6 points, in theory, should be a wake up call. However, Pop skates by with a lot of bad coaching because of his past success.

Low IQ Basketball

Blake Wesley and Malaki Branham both have positive attributes so before I trash them, I won’t pretend like they never contribute. Wesley is lighting quick, annoying on defense, and generally makes stuff happen. Branham is a streaky shooter who is more on than off — he can put up points in a hurry.

But these guys both play incredibly dumb basketball. At a few points in the third quarter, the Spurs were threatening to turn this into a game and were only down 7, but Wesley and Branham ensured that wouldn’t happen with dumb shots, dumb plays, and dumb turnovers.

Honorable mention goes to Keldon Johnson who has a few more IQ points, but still regularly hurts the Spurs with predictable, low percentage lunges at the basket.

And let’s go ahead and throw Pop in here because we’re 86 games into Victor’s career and we just hit another low point in terms of not involving Victor.

What Doesn’t Work for Victor

At this point, it should be very clear that posting up Victor really doesn’t work.

If he’s near the basket, sure.

But otherwise, his body just isn’t built for backing down shorter defenders — who always have a base advantage. What happens is the Spurs post up Victor and he usually gets pushed out 5 feet from his starting point and/or gets stood up.

And with the Spurs unable to create spacing, opponents can swarm and help.

What also doesn’t work is Victor dribbling to the hoop from 20 feet out. Again, opponents just dig in and the possession is essentially over.

So given this, you’d think the Spurs would start coming up with other plays, but instead we see the same post ups and drives over and over again.

At this point, all that’s left is for Victor to hoist threes.

Again, if this was another coach, he’d already be fired.

Other Notes

Harrison Barnes was a nice addition. I love his no hesitation shooting and moves. He got Chet on a really nice upfake and dunk. Somehow this didn’t make the highlights, though.

Chris Paul is still uncharacteristically turning the ball over. Yet, he did make solid contributions on offense.

The Spurs defense also had some impressive possessions. The Thunder had at least two 24 second violations and were forced into bad shots multiple times because of near violations.

Mamu finally got in the game. He wasn’t able to make an impact (he didn’t really have a chance), but Pop finally got over himself and gave one of the highest IQ guys a chance.

At one point I was listening to the Thunder broadcast and somehow the early play where Chet broke up the alley oop from Jeremy to Victor was called a block. On Reddit, I saw the same rhetoric. It wasn’t a block, Victor never even had the ball.

Lu Dort absolutely made it rain from 3. You have to wonder how close this game would have been if Dort didn’t +3 every few minutes.

Wasn’t Jeremy Sochan able to serviceably shoot threes at one point? His shot and his confidence look broken.

The Spurs team, as a whole, doesn’t value the basketball. This is why we continually see careless turnovers, some unforced and others due to ordinary pressure. A coach is needed to instill that continually giving possession of the ball away is not acceptable.

Final Thoughts

Given how much went wrong for the Spurs and how much went right for the Thunder, I’m surprised that the Spurs were able to almost make this a competitive game.

The Thunder have the best defense in the league and are the best team overall, but that’s still not an excuse for not being able to get a generational talent in scoring position.

Devin Vassell can’t come back soon enough. When he does, his offense will instantly lift the team.

Finally, the Spurs desperately need a new coach. It’s been time for Pop for years. He indicated he was going to retire when Tim Duncan did and then he just kind of hung around and now he’s holding the franchise hostage.

The Spurs need a new voice at the helm. Someone with energy and zest who isn’t comfortable with status quo; someone that feels pressure to win and advance.

Sean Elliott is my suggestion.

P.S. Victor Wembanyama had a very distant and displeased look on his face as he sat towards the end of the bench. Spurs ownership needs to take note of the franchise’s displeasure. If he gets fed up with Gregg Popovich’s politics over basketball mentality, there goes a billion dollars worth of valuation.