Victor Wembanyama hasn’t even played close to a full season of basketball yet, but he’s already doing things as a 20-year-old that are breaking the internet.
The Spurs have kept Wemby’s minutes low, sitting him in various back-to-backs and keeping his season average under 30 minutes per game. That hasn’t stopped him from creating viral highlights on a nightly basis. A 7-4 center isn’t supposed to dream of doing the things that he’s been pulling off.
Here are the plays that have already shown how Wembanyama is truly one of one.
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These Victor Wembanyama plays will blow your mind
The finger-roll dunk
Derrick White has been one of the best guards in the league at chase-down blocks. He had no shot against Wemby, who caught this ball behind the halfcourt line, took exactly one dribble and easily dunked it:
White made the smart business decision to get out of the way at the last moment.
“I’m not an idiot,” White laughed when talking to reporters after the game. “I was just trying to get out of the way. That was crazy.”
This looked like a dunk straight out of Space Jam. It’s no wonder that LeBron James has called Wemby an alien.
Stuffing Giannis Antetokounmpo at the rim
When is the last time you remember Giannis getting blocked on a dunk attempt? It doesn’t happen often — he’s in the 96th percentile of finishers at the rim.
That’s exactly what happened in a one-possession game with under a minute left when the Greek Freak challenged Wemby. The rookie absorbed the contact, rose up and blocked it cleanly, even managing to keep the ball in play for a chance to tie the game.
“I’ve never seen anything like it,” Giannis said afterward. “I don’t know how tall he is. He’s not 7-3. He’s way taller than 7-3. Whoever says he’s 7-3, that’s a lie.”
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Nutmegs galore
Plenty of guards have used the nutmeg — throwing the ball between a defender’s legs — but a giant center doing it against a guard is a whole different story.
Watch Wemby’s moves against the Rockets’ Reggie Bullock in the open floor:
That nutmeg isn’t a one-off either. Wembanyama broke out the move again a few months later against the Pistons, throwing a dime between the legs of Bojan Bogdanovic to set up a layup.
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Off-the-backboard alley-oop
Wembanyama’s not only throwing slick passes to teammates. He’s also setting himself up.
How about splitting the defense, throwing it underhand and slamming it through the net?
Wembanyama started a trend, with Anthony Edwards and Joel Embiid pulling off the move in later weeks.
One-legged triple
One-legged 3s have been tried before in the WNBA, most notably by Wemby’s French compatriot Marine Johannes in the 2023 Finals. But they’re exceedingly rare in the NBA.
That is until Wembanyama nailed one against the Grizzlies.
It’s not as if this was a desperation heave. Wemby started his shooting motion with nine seconds left on the clock. That’s how confident he was in it going in.
Wembanyama pulled it off in France, but doing it 30 feet out in a one-possession game is something we’d never seen before.
Behind-the-back dunk
Brook Lopez finished second in Defensive Player of the Year voting last season. That didn’t stop Wemby from going behind the back and yamming it over him to draw an and-one.
A dunk like that hadn’t been pulled off since Chris Webber dunked on Charles Barkley 30 years ago.
The longest Shammgod that you’ve ever seen
The Shammgod, named after former college star and NBA player God Shammgod, has been used by a lot of players before. But seeing it performed by someone with an 8-foot wingspan is something else.
That Wemby had the audacity to pull this off against Rudy Gobert, who is a favorite to win his fourth Defensive Player of the Year award, is something else. Players fear challenging him at the basket, and Wemby got there without even using his left hand.
