When San Antonio Spurs star Victor Wembanyama entered Tuesday night's game against the Memphis Grizzlies with 1:46 remaining in the fourth quarter, it wasn't because his Hall of Fame coach, Gregg Popovich, sent him in.
“I wasn't allowed to sub in but I still did it. The coach sent me out right after,” the Spurs leading scorer said.
Asked, following the Spurs' 106-98 loss, if he feels like he's ready to play more minutes, Wemby didn't hesitate.
“Yes,” the top overall pick in the 2023 NBA Draft answered with perhaps as much frustration as anticipation.
The generational prospect is on a minutes restriction due to right ankle issues that started ahead of the team's Dec. 19 match-up with the Milwaukee Bucks. Due to what the injury report listed as “soreness,” that contest ended being only the second outing he missed through the first 26 games of his young NBA career.
Set to return two games later, Wemby rolled that same ankle on a ball boy's foot prior to facing the Dallas Mavericks. Though Popovich would say afterward that Wembanyama probably would've suited up had it been a playoff game and that his star rookie wanted to play, the 7'4 big man was held out for precautionary reasons.
Victor Wembanyama gets candid about his playing time
Wembanyama has played in four of the Spurs' five games since that night in Dallas, missing the second night of a back-to-back against the Portland Trail Blazers last week. The Spurs are limiting him to 24 minutes per game as a result of the right ankle tweaks that occurred leading up to Christmas.
Tuesday, he checked himself back in — despite his coach's wishes — with San Antonio about to cut what had been a 16-point deficit just minutes before to ten with two Jeremy Sochan free throws.
“I understand, of course, I'm wrong for, you know, wanting to…you know, I agree with this restriction so I'm wrong if…” the French phenom hesitated, almost as if his trying to figure out the best way to phrase frustration equaled his search for the correct words in English.
“During the game, I just talk to the coaches and say, yeah, like, I played 25 minutes already, what's two more? Looking back, of course, I understand their point of view, but at the moment it's hard,” Wembanyama continued.
He led the team with 20 points and four blocks, and his seven rebounds were tops along with Dominick Barlow.
“At the moment, of course, I want to play. I'm frustrated. The wise option is to listen to the staff but it's hard. It's frustrating.”
They're emotions that carry over from Wembanyama's first experience with limited playing time because of the sore right ankle. Following the December 26 loss to the Utah Jazz, he told ClutchPoints the following:
“We communicate a lot with the medical staff,” he continued, “If it was up to me, I'd play in every game, of course. I respect my role. They're professionals and I'm a professional.”
For his part, Popovich didn't reveal much about when Wemby might come off the minutes restriction.
“I don't know. In a certain amount of time, we're going to take more pictures, and that'll determine whether the minute thing changes or not,” the NBA's longest-tenured coach said following the loss in Memphis and before Wemby's comments. “It's the same every night. I think we were a minute off tonight. Twenty-four is the deal.”
That wasn't the deal Tuesday when Victor Wembanyama officially played 26 minutes, with the final 36 seconds being without his head coach's consent.
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