On Thursday, the San Antonio Spurs announced that their phenom Victor Wembanyama would miss the remainder of the 2024-2025 NBA season due to a blood clot diagnosis in his shoulder.
At 23-29, the Spurs are currently in 12th place in the West and despite their pre-deadline trade for De’Aaron Fox, now seem very unlikely to make a postseason push without Wemby, who averaged 24.3 points, 11.0 rebounds, 3.7 assists, 3.8 blocks and 1.1 steals in 33.2 minutes per game across 46 contests en route to his first All-Star appearance.
With him active this season, the Spurs have gone 21-25 and without him, they've gone 2-4.
In addition to tanking the hopes of anyone who had a Spurs’ playoff future ticket, this diagnosis also crushes anyone who had a Wembanyama Defensive Player of the Year ticket. Per BetMGM, he was juiced all the way to -2500 as a near lock to win the award, attracting 20.4% of the tickets and 29.8% of the handle in the market before he was ruled out for the season. (Look for Jaren Jackson Jr., Evan Mobley, Lu Dort, Dillon Brooks and Dyson Daniels to make strides in that market when new odds are released.)
On a game-by-game basis, Fox should pick up some more usage while Devin Vassell and Stephon Castle also pick up shot volume. Chris Paul will likely see more opportunities to facilitate as well while guys like Keldon Johnson, Jeremy Sochan and Julian Champagnie get more opportunities to produce as well. It might be best to take a wait-and-see approach in player prop markets, but Wembanyama’s loss will likely be catastrophic on both ends of the floor.
More than anything, this is another reminder that there are no sure things in the betting world. What looked like a complete lock for Wemby to win DPOY is now a completely wide-open market, which is fascinating. Stay tuned for analysis and best bets and, most importantly, best wishes for the big man’s health moving forward.
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