Editor’s Note: A great way to kick off the week is by welcoming another talented member of the Canis team. Known in the comments section as EightTwo0 (formerly FreeDieng/Free3Jelica), Patrick Dooley will be blessing us with his talents from time to time. Everyone say hi!
It’s our favorite form of off-season content: young player hype.
A tale as old as time, where we get so psyched about a relative unknown, only for the engine to sputter and the bandwagon to ultimately crash, while the sad trombone player saunters in, once again, to smear those all-too-familiar descending four notes.
But, I don’t know, dare I say this one feels different?
Instead of looking forward, for now let’s bracket that off, take a beat, and journey back to January 13, 2026, where a certain 19-year-old
finally got his run.
Earlier this year on an unassuming Tuesday in Milwaukee, smack dead in the middle of the season, a Rudy Gobert suspension granted Joan Beringer the rare opportunity to log some serious rotation minutes. By game’s end – a 139-106 Wolves blowout win – the Frenchman had played 30 minutes, and while his stat line didn’t exactly leap off the page (13 points, five rebounds, two assists, one steal, and four fouls), a stamp was affixed with the insignia of a baby baguette.
Of those 13 points, in no particular order we saw a lob dunk, a transition floater off the glass, Beringer muscling the ball from a herd of deer for a layup, and a right-place-right-time tip-in off a Bones Hyland carom. There was also an impressive up-and-under scoop lay-in, where he maneuvered through none other than Giannis Antetokounmpo to score. Was this from where the nickname “French Freak” got its origin?
Of his five boards, four were on the offensive end, with kick-outs and tap-outs that generated second-chance looks. And while he didn’t register any blocks that night, he affected several shots. He scrapped for loose balls and just flat-out battled. It was clear that this is a kid with the sauce we all know and love. A sauce that tastes like, mmm…potential.
Beringer concluded that January Bucks game with a plus-minus second only to Bones (+41) at a +30, which, while not the best performance indicator, certainly matched the eye test on this one winter night.
But this wasn’t just a one-off.
A couple nights later in San Antonio, again Beringer played competitive minutes, contributing to a valiant 29-point comeback effort that ultimately fell short. In fact his impact in that game was so notable that even the Spurs broadcast team couldn’t stop mentioning him. Even with Anthony Edwards’ 39-point second-half explosion, it was Beringer getting recognized for his role in the miraculous late-game turnaround.
Although it wasn’t enough, in a three-point loss Beringer led the team in plus-minus with a +9 in 23 minutes of play. And once again, the eye test said, “Yup, that checks out.”
When Beringer is on the floor, it’s undeniable. Good stuff happens. And this coming from a kid who didn’t pick up a basketball until he was 15. A mere three-ish years of competitive ball later, and there he was taking on the challenge of squaring up against Giannis and Victor Wembanyama, two of the greatest players in the world.
It’s a lot to ask of someone who has yet to truly blossom as a player. Beringer is a yearling in this sport. And yet, he has proven to be fearless, hungry, but also teachable, adaptable, and willing to learn. He is a student of the game. A game with a considerable learning curve, one that can prove daunting and unmerciful to its wide-eyed greenhorns.
But by all accounts, Beringer is a fast learner. It’s gotten him this far, and in such an absurdly short amount of time, too.
The stuff you can’t teach
Watching Beringer glide and shuffle around the court, it’s already clear that there is a dynamism to his approach. He can play big and impose his will, trying to rock the rim whenever the opportunity arises. But he also has the unique ability to play smaller, to slither and find little crevices to sneak through, capitalizing in tight spaces. He has the tenacity to go up and stuff it, but also the finesse to pull back and deliver soft touches around the rim. His adaptability in low-post scoring situations is already a skillset that he will continue to hone as he gets more in-game reps.
He is also a process-driven player. If you notice when he is on the floor, his instincts are largely systematic: setting screens, rolling to the rim, cutting, or trying to put himself in position to crash the glass. It would seem his objectives are simple and team-focused: to help put the ball through the hoop on offense, and to keep the ball away from the rim on defense. That’s a player whose floor can still impact winning.
Reaching his ceiling, which is still tantalizingly unknowable, comes down to his level of want-to and work ethic, which seems quite high.
This offseason, Beringer has been hard at work in the lab trying to add new wrinkles to his game. Like a mid-range jump shot, for one.
Last season his shooting form sort of looked like how I shoot on a pop-a-shot at the fair. It’s still a work in progress, but those two words – work and progress – are why we remain so bullish on him as a project.
Coming into his own
Beringer is clearly still coming into his own body. A while back during one of my humdrum doom scrolls, I watched a video of a newborn foal covered in goo and woozily stumbling around, trying to get their hooves under them, and I thought, “Hey, that reminds me of someone.” Much like Beringer, a baby horse’s first movements are clumsy because their body is struggling to catch up to an already active brain.
We harp a lot on positioning and restraint when it comes to Beringer’s habits, but what he needs most of all is repetition so that his body can catch up to his processing speed. Eventually, that processing will reach automaticity – on autopilot but still cerebral and analytical. It’s just going to take some time to get there.
The fouling tendencies are twofold. As Beringer continues to come into his own, his positioning should improve, and his reaction time will decrease as he grows more comfortable within the flow of the game and more familiar with different looks and reads. But it’s also a matter of the officials getting more familiar with Beringer. Last season there were plenty of judgment calls that ended up not going his way. Such is the life of a rookie big man. As he gets more experience, the refs will be more apt to swallow their whistles on marginal contact plays. Again, repetition is key.
Born in the commune of Sélestat, France, Beringer’s first love was soccer. It echoes shades of another French-speaking center who ran the pitch into his mid-teens before eventually switching over to basketball, a player we are not particularly fond of around these parts (his name rhymes with Noel M. Reid), but hey, anytime you can draw any sort of comparison to a former MVP…
Beringer stopped playing soccer when he could no longer fit into a pair of cleats, and according to reports, he’s still growing. (now that’s what I call offseason hype!)
Jokes aside, Beringer’s growth is obviously not limited to his height or putting on more muscle. It isn’t just basketball-related either. This is a kid who moved to an entirely new continent, having known barely a lick of the language. It’s a culture shock, to be sure, but a life-changing opportunity that he seems to be embracing with every inch of his 7’4.5”, and growing, wingspan.
Yes, the Wolves have had a long and tortured history of young prospects who don’t pan out, or even come close to being playable (looking at you, Jonny F****, Wes Johnson, Derrick Williams, Jarrett Culver, the list goes on).
This one, though, feels different. Maybe it’s the culture shift this franchise has undergone. From Ant arriving to Chris Finch taking the reins to new ownership stepping in, sparing us from the decades of mediocre at best, laughing stock at worst. But whatever the case may be, we seem to no longer embody that meme of the white ninja with a stick going “C’mon, do something.”
So, with that, I say:
Stunt on them, Beringer. Your future is so bright, it just might be a glare hazard. Pretty soon we’re all going to have to wear shades. I’ve already ordered mine.
