San Antonio Spurs star Victor Wembanyama is expected to miss the remainder of the season with deep vein thrombosis in his right shoulder, according to a team announcement on Thursday.
The club’s medical team discovered the clot during an examination following Wembanyama’s return from the NBA All-Star game. San Antonio believe that their star forward will make a full recovery, however the blood-thinning medication which is used to treat the issue, will preclude Wemby from participating in basketball activities for the foreseeable future.
“It’s tough,” teammate Chris Paul said. “Tough more than anything, I think for all of us, knowing how much he means to our team, but more so knowing how much he means to the game and how much he loves to play.”
“I think everybody understands that basketball is what we do and not who we are,” Paul continued. “So life and everything is so much more important, but for us, we know losing a big part of our team like that is [made up] by committee. And trust me, you can’t replace Vic. I can’t stand on a guy’s shoulders and block every shot that comes to the rim.”
“Aside from his basketball ability, his charisma and what he brings into the locker room I think is what we’ll miss the most.”
Through 46 games, the 21 year old has averaged 24.3pts/11reb/3.7ast/3.8blk per game. Because he’ll fail to reach the 65 games played threshold, Wembanyama will be ineligible for any end of season awards, including Defensive Player of the Year. At the time of his injury, the All-World forward was a -2000 favourite to win the award at most sports books.
Wembanyama had taken 403 3-point attempts and blocked 176 shots at the All-Star break, a feat that no other player in NBA history had accomplished over the course of a full season. Now, he’ll be relegated to the sidelines as he and Spurs head coach Gregg Popovich recover from their respective ailments in what’s now seeming like a lost season in San Antonio.
The 23-29 Spurs are next in action Thursday night against the Phoenix Suns in a 9:30pm ET showdown.
Photo: Thomas S. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license.