WembVP
Everything is in place for Victor Wembanyama to make the leap to NBA MVP. This award tends to have a three-circle Venn diagram of team performance, statistical output and narrative. The Spurs project to once again compete for the best record in the league, his two-way impact puts him toward the top of impact metrics and voter fatigue with back-to-back winner Shai Gilgeous-Alexander should work in his favor.
Looking at this award’s recent history, players often win twice in a row but can’t make it three. That happened to Giannis Antetokounmpo, Steph Curry, Steve Nash and Tim Duncan. Sometimes, that’s because they start to prioritize winning in June over all-out effort in October through April. Or their team dynamics shift to where they are no longer making an outsized impact. But in reality, the big element is voter fatigue. People are entranced by the shiny new thing that makes the game feel different. Somehow, Nikola Jokić’s game has been normalized, even though few players have been as dominant relative to their era as the Denver Nuggets’ three-time MVP.
Wembanyama is approaching that territory. His offensive game is still raw from an execution perspective, and the small snippets he’s shown in the preseason don’t clearly indicate what his next step looks like. He is one of the most versatile offensive weapons in the game, with Jokić being the only other big who can own every single inch of the court.
The question throughout last year was whether Wembanyama’s historic defensive impact could offset the execution advantage of the last two MVP winners. The answer was no, although he would have been right there had his first half of the season been as good as his second half. A consistent season from Wembanyama, with even moderate offensive improvement, could be enough for him to ascend into MVP front-runner by the time he turns 23 in January. That would set him on a path that could open one of the longest MVP windows we’ve seen.
Three-guard lineup will start opening night
There really is no right answer to choose starters on this team. There are several viable combinations. Moving Dylan Harper to the starting lineup is not optimal. It doesn’t fit a system around Wembanyama based on the last decade we’ve watched of post-modern, outside-in basketball. It shrinks the floor for a player who needs spacing to get close enough to the rim to throw the ball through it.
But the Spurs already bucked some conventions in Mitch Johnson’s first full season and built something that worked well. The structure of the system held up in the playoffs, but the execution from the Spurs’ young studs wasn’t good enough in the end. That will improve again this season, just as it did in the last.
Last year proved that having multiple ballhandlers with great floater range can work alongside Wembanyama. The Spurs saw that as long as help defenders were pushed out toward the corners, their guards could get deep enough into the defense to have multiple options. They were middle of the pack in 3-point percentage and frequency, which is good enough with their downhill scoring and defense. If they replace Julian Champagnie with Harper, they will likely see the frequency from that spot in the lineup cut in half. The upside is that it will give the offense more flow and unpredictability, taking some burden off Wembanyama and increasing his stamina late in games.
Read the rest here for free: https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/7687247/2026/10/16/spurs-nba-predictions-wemby-dylan-harper/?unlocked_article_code=1.JFE.O6O7.Ikrg34o1SK_M&source=emp_shared_article&smid=url-share-ta
