LeBron James on what makes Victor Wembanyama truly unique and scary

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On Friday, the San Antonio Spurs will host the Oklahoma City Thunder in Game 3 of the Western Conference finals in Texas after the two teams split the first two games. While the Thunder are the defending NBA champions and are expected by plenty to win the series, there is a sense that Victor Wembanyama has arrived and that this series will be a dogfight.

Wembanyama had 41 points, 24 rebounds and three blocks in a Game 1 double-overtime victory. From the day he entered the league in the fall of 2023, everyone knew he would be a special superstar, but now that people are seeing him for the first time on a big stage, he is starting to look truly scary.

LeBron James elicited the same reactions from people when he appeared in his first conference final series in 2007 and led the Cleveland Cavaliers to the NBA Finals with an incredible clutch performance in Game 5 of that matchup versus the Detroit Pistons. On his "Mind the Game" podcast, he broke down what makes Wembanyama truly unique and scary, besides the fact that the 22-year-old is listed at 7-foot-4.

“He’s not the first guy in our league that’s been tall,” James said. “He’s not the first guy in our league that had length or been tall, he’s not, so we can nip that in the bud right now guys. And yes, it is a factor because his length, his size, the way he’s able to cover a lot of ground, especially defensively.

“But when we talk about what he’s able to do offensively -- his ability to put the ball on the ground, we’ve seen him iso-ing multiple Defensive Player of the Year Rudy Gobert multiple times on the perimeter. Hitting him with snatch-backs, spins, up-and-unders, dream shakes, fadeaways. We’ve seen him cross-dribble, step-back out of the corner for 3. His ability to catch and his coordination, which sometimes looks uncoordinated, but it’s because of his length. His ability to catch the ball with his back towards the basket, or half his body, and be able to find the rim before he even lands, that is coordination that we’ve never seen before and it’s not just because he’s tall. It’s because he has the ability to do things that we haven’t seen in our league like, ever.

“But his IQ — you can tell by the way he talks, you can tell by his demeanor — he knows the game. He was taught the game the right way and San Antonio continues to get lucky as [expletive] with these generational-talented, IQ, smart, but keep the main thing the main thing. David Robinson, Tim Duncan and now Wemby. Guys who just have this dead-serious mentality. They have these horse blinders on and they’re like the mission is the mission and that’s all that matters. It’s pretty remarkable to see.”

To go along with all that, what may make Wembanyama scarier than anything else is his ability and willingness to raise his game under pressure and in big moments. In Game 1 on Monday, he continually made plays on both ends of the floor late in the fourth quarter and in both overtimes. He's not afraid of the moment; in fact, he probably embraces it.

He trained with a renowned monk in China last summer, and his agent met with Los Angeles Lakers general manager Rob Pelinka to ask and learn about the late great Kobe Bryant's mentality and training. Perhaps the only thing that can stop Wembanyama at this point is injury or health issues — other than that, this could be his league for many years to come.

This article originally appeared on LeBron Wire: LeBron James on what makes Victor Wembanyama truly unique and scary

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