Sunday evening, after dinner, I called my mother in Indiana. She had seen the pictures: Victor Wembanyama training with Provence Rugby, a club in the French second division, which published them. Harrison Barnes was there too, at the same sessions.
She asked what a basketball player goes to do among rugby players. I read her what the sources say: work on new movement patterns. The summer before, it was Shaolin monks in China, about two weeks. This summer, on top of the rugby, Hakeem Olajuwon for the second time, and the World Cup qualifiers with France.
Let me tell you, in 2000 my summer programme was a bag and a plane to Charleroi. The only new movement I learned was stepping over the badminton lines without losing my balance. It took me a month.
My mother wanted to know how he finished the season. I told her: twenty-five points, eleven and a half rebounds, three blocks a game, and the first Defensive Player of the Year elected unanimously. Nobody voted against. On Sunday, at the scrimmage, the hall was already chanting “MVP”.
Then she asked her question. Always the same one. When he was with the rugby players, who was defending?
I thought about it. In rugby, everybody defends, that’s more or less the point. A whole sport built on the box-out, with no basket to rest at. And he did not even go there for the defence: the sources say new movement patterns and physical strength. The defence, he already had.
She said: see? He did what I’ve been telling you since you were eight.
It’s true, we checked: Eurohoops.
