Victor Wembanyama Was Asked His Thoughts On The 65-Game Rule. In Response, He Gave A Math Lesson

More often than not, playing in the NBA comes down to a numbers game. One number that’s on everyone’s mind at this point is 65, which is the minimum number of games that an NBA player needs to log in order to maintain award eligibility.

There are many individuals within the NBA community who take issue with this 65-game rule, and one of them happens to be an intimidating 7-foot-4 French phenom.

At a recent media session, when asked about the work that it takes for elite players to get to 65 games, Victor Wembanyama argued that eligibility for year-end awards is not the end-all, be-all for individual performance in the league.

To prove his point, Wemby cited three of his most renowned peers: Cade Cunningham, Luka Dončić, and Anthony Edwards. This trio, unfortunately, fell short of the 65-game minimum. “Even if those three aren’t [eligible] for the end-of-season awards, for sure it’s not going to reflect their impact on this season,” Wembanyama said.

The San Antonio Spurs’ main man did agree that there has to be a “threshold” for players to meet if they are to contend for awards. The question, of course, is what that threshold will be.

Leave it to Wembanyama, a smart young man, to crunch the numbers in order to figure out if a minimum would even make sense. “If a guy plays 50 games, 35 minutes a game…that’s 50 times 35…1,750, right? If a guy plays 75 games at 20 minutes, it’s 1,500…so, it’s a good view to not have a limit,” he said.

The basketball headline here is supposed to be, “Victor Wembanyama Picks Apart 65-Game Rule, Believes in Setting No Limits.” Instead, this clip is worthy of the caption: “Wemby Does Mental Math, Needs No Calculator for Two-Digit by Two-Digit Multiplication.”

Not satisfied, Wemby even worked the decimals. “75% of the games might be an illogical thing. That’ll be…61.5 games, right? So, 62 games?” After an awkward silence, one reporter reassured the athlete-slash-mathematician: “Your math on all of those was spot-on.”

Wembanyama had a good chuckle at that. He might not be smiling as much over the next two months, but he’ll be grinning ear-to-ear if the Spurs get to win no. 16 when all is said and done in the postseason. As for getting the MVP award, Wemby might get one, two, three… and the math might not be mathing at that point.