San Antonio Spurs rookie Victor Wembanyama has been heralded one of the preeminent prospects of all-time. Among the few popular critiques of his potential are his weight, given he stands 7’4, 209 pounds. Despite that, Wembanyama’s agent, Bouna Ndiaye, thinks focusing on adding weight as a means of improvement and opening up his game are misguided.
Instead, he’s focused on Wembanyama increasing his functional strength and deems that integral to a lengthy, prosperous career.
“People are wrong. We’re not focused at all on weights. I don’t want to put weight on his body. We’re going to fight to not put weight on his body. Weight on his body [is] a big mistake,” Ndiaye told Andscape’s Marc J. Spears. “We focus on strength, core. We were very pleased that he linked up [with Kareem Abdul-] Jabbar who played until [41] years old.
“I’m very glad they, they connected because uh, have a similar body type. Kareem was not heavy. Victor is more mobile, gaudier and taller than Kareem. So, that difference in height is a challenge and is something that we are working on every day. Making him heavy? We don’t want to do that.”
Wembanyama’s brief introduction to NBA hoops before being shut down for the remainder of Summer League was up and down. In his debut against the Charlotte Hornets on Friday, he struggled as a scorer with nine points on 2-for-13 shooting, but added eight rebounds, five blocks and three assists.
Two days later, against the Portland Trail Blazers, he bounced back in the scoring column behind 27 points on 9-for-14 shooting, while chipping in 12 boards, three blocks and one steal. We’ll presumably next see Wembenyama when the Spurs begin their preseason schedule in the fall, at which point we can gauge what sort of desired progress he and Ndiaye have made in refining his core strength.
Source: https://uproxx.com/dimemag/victor-wembanyama-agent-says-weight-concerns-wrong/
