The unquantifiable impact of Victor Wembanyama on defense by normal metrics has fascinated fans and analysts alike for most of his career. Wemby leads the league in blocks, but his presence inside completely changes the way opponents play in a way not even other elite shot blockers can replicate. It’s why he’ll likely win Defensive Player of the Year and is part of his case for Most Valuable Player.
Wembanyama is now doing the same on the other end as well. The superstar big man is averaging 24 points
but only three assists, generating fewer than eight points with his dimes a game, a much lower amount than most elite offensive players. What even the tracking numbers are failing to capture is how much his mere presence creates opportunities for others.
Gravity in basketball is a basic concept. Do defenders stick close to an offensive player instead of helping off them? Do they send extra defenders to cover that offensive player, leaving others open? If even one of the answers to those questions is “yes,” then the offensive player has positive gravity. If the answer to both is affirmative, as is the case with Wemby, then the offensive player has elite gravity and creates buckets without touching the ball.
The game against the Heat had that dynamic in full display. Whenever Wembanyama would roll hard, an open corner three would be created without him even touching the ball or sometimes making contact as a screener. It’s not a once-off thing. The Spurs lead the league in corner threes attempted, as Hoops Tonight explained on a great video that covers a lot of the same ground we’ve covered here so far. The threat of Wemby getting a shot at the rim is getting others looks from the best place to launch jumpers, and it’s not like opponents are just allowing bad shooters to fire away, as the Spurs have four guys taking at least one corner three per game and shooting over 39 percent on them.
To break it down even further, the corner three-point attempt frequency for every single rotation Spur except Stephon Castle increases with Wemby on the floor, sometimes significantly, according to PBPStats.com. The same is true for every player’s corner three-point field goal percentage except for Harrison Barnes. It’s not just one or two players benefiting from Wembanyama’s gravity, but essentially the whole team. And the looks they are getting appear to be better, going by the conversion rate. There’s not a lot of need for the numbers when the eye test makes something obvious, but the stats support the thesis that Wemby is a special creator without the ball.
Now, a lot of rim-running centers have gravity, because it’s hard to guard any screening action with just two players. If the corner threes were all he was facilitating, Wemby would be, as the ultimate lob threat, just a better version of players we’ve seen in the past. But Wembanyama has gravity in the perimeter as well.
The NBA has an official gravity stat that has an opaque tracking and AI-aided formula. It might not be the best way to measure gravity, but it does measure all players the same, and it aims to quantify “how much a player pulls defenders towards them above expected, essentially measuring how much attention they draw compared to what the spacing on the floor predicts.” Wembanyama ranks very highly in off-ball interior gravity, as it would be expected. But he also ranks very highly for a big man in perimeter gravity. In both categories, he ranks the highest for any big man.
We’ve seen this in action in several configurations. When Wembanyama sets a screen and doesn’t dive, his defender normally stays with him, which opens up driving lanes for his teammates. When he’s spotting up, often his man will not venture far, because scrambling to close out is futile against a 7’4” shooter. The Spurs create the sixth most points on drives in the league. As it happened with corner threes, the frequency of shots at the rim for Wembanyama’s teammates increases when he’s on the floor, and the main ball handlers see their efficiency improve at the rim with Wemby drawing the attention of the defense. Wemby makes offense simpler for everyone else.
Wembanyama is a unique talent who continues to discover how to use his skills while the rest of the NBA world tries to keep up by measuring his impact in new ways. Ever since the Pistons game in which he took a backseat as an on-ball threat, he’s unlocked his ability to completely change games on both ends without having to log a block or an assist. His numbers are already MVP-level good, but somehow fail to show the many ways he helps the Spurs win.
