Victor Wembanyama and five other NBA players with a surprising skill

If you consume enough NBA media, you’ll note how often we pigeonhole players into rigid categories. The superstars get more than their fair share of the discussion, but everyone else falls into generalities: the game manager, the rim-running big man, etcetera. After a while, players can blur together like uniform blocks within their segments, interchangeable and faceless. Categorization makes for easier conversation and analysis but loses the nuances that make basketball the best sport.

That’s a bummer! It’s fun to celebrate the individuality of each player, to look a little deeper into how they play. Below, I’ve gathered six players with quirks or tendencies that the general public doesn’t recognize enough. Some of these notes are borderline silly, and some are essential parts of what makes a player tick. But all deserve more (or at least a little!) discussion.

Disclaimer: I’m not always saying that these players are the absolute best at a thing. I’m simply highlighting unexpected skills or idiosyncrasies that aren’t well-known outside the local market. Don’t expect LeBron James to show up, but we may as well start with the biggest name (literally and figuratively).

Victor Wembanyama (San Antonio)

Recovering blocks

However ridiculous you think Wembanyama’s defense was last season, it only gets kookier the deeper you go.

Wemby led the league in blocks by a mile last season (and a mile and a half after the All-Star break, when he denied 4.5 attempts per game). He accumulated 254 in total, 64 more than second-place Chet Holmgren.

More interestingly, of the 55 players who swatted at least 50 shots, Wembanyama had the highest block recovery rate. The Spurs gained possession on over two-thirds of Wemby’s swats (68.11 percent)! He doesn’t just kill shots; he zombifies them into fast-break opportunities for San Antonio. Wembanyama turns highlights into inflection points.

Smashing a layup into the 12th row is fun. It’s cathartic, allowing defenders a chance to assert dominance, mean mug for the crowd, and fire up their teammates. Wembanyama is certainly capable of those kinds of blocks. But turning an opponent’s star-crossed hook shot (a shot designed to be unblockable) into three points the other way is so much more powerful:

Wembanyama mashes a lot of shots off the backboard, keeping them in play for teammates to gather, and just straight-up inhales plenty more, Bill Russell-style. There will always be an element of luck to recovering blocks, but this ain’t sheer happenstance:

Maybe I’ll get tired of watching Wembanyama appropriating shot attempts one day, but it won’t be anytime soon.

Nickeil Alexander-Walke (Minnesota)

Kicked balls

Nikola Jokic made waves two seasons ago when he started booting entry passes every other game – his 47 kicked balls that year are the most we’ve seen in the tracking data era. Kicked balls can be a useful way to stop ball penetration into the paint, and they only reset the shot clock to 14 seconds.

Punting the ball is primarily the domain of big men lashing out with a toe to keep a pocket pass from slipping by them in the pick-and-roll. Jokic, Nikola Vucevic, and Bam Adebayo always hover near the top of the leaderboards.

But Alexander-Walker is the rare wing who weaponizes the kicked ball, too. His 15 such violations last year ranked fifth in the league (and first among non-centers), and although he had a smaller role in the previous years, he usually ranked near the top on a per-minute basis.

Please enjoy the most boring highlight ever snipped:

(Boring or not, I do chuckle at the way Gary Payton II immediately realizes he should’ve faked high before passing low. Fundamentals, Gary!)

Kicking passes away might not be a game-changing skill, but it’s still a fun quirk of NAW’s game.

Corey Kispert (Washington)

Finishing at the rim

I don’t blame you if you haven’t watched much Wizards basketball lately, but there are always fun wrinkles to discover for any team. One of my favorite pieces of Wizards minutiae for a while has been how effectively Corey Kispert finishes at the rack.

Most fans only know Kispert as a long-range gunner. Kispert shot 39 percent from beyond the arc last year (excluding heaves) on heavy volume. But Kispert, like all the best shooters, knows how to warp gravity to open up driving and cutting lanes.

The former Gonzaga Bulldog has converted between 74 percent and 76 percent of his rim attempts in his three seasons, a top-decile mark for wings. And the sample size isn’t tiny (by our standards): a quarter of his shots are at the hoop, an average share, and he has accumulated more than 400 attempts (excluding fouls drawn). He was also an excellent finisher in college.

Kispert isn’t beating guys off the dribble in isolation. Instead, he works (and works hard) as an off-ball Energizer bunny, zooming around screens and hand-offs at full speed until a crack in the defense opens.

Kispert is better equipped to pry apart those creases than people realize, measuring 6-foot-6 without shoes and boasting a 38-inch vertical. He doesn’t dunk often, but when he does, he can reach thinner air, even in traffic, with surprising force:

Straight-line strength is Kispert’s calling card. If he gets a head of steam, he’ll shoulder smaller defenders out of the way – and sometimes larger ones, too. David “Big Body” Roddy certainly wasn’t expecting to be outmuscled by Kispert and his headband:

For special occasions, Kispert will dust off his dancing shoes:

Kispert’s game has grown in Washington, and last year proved that he has some still-untapped reservoirs of playmaking and off-the-bounce juice. His minutes per game jumped from 22 to 31 after new coach Brian Keefe took the reins, and his scoring rose from 11 to nearly 16 points per night. He put up even larger numbers once Keefe permanently instated him as a starter in early March.

Kispert is eligible for a contract extension, and the Wizards may want to keep him around to help space the floor for young prospects like Alex Sarr, Bilal Coulibaly, and Bub Carrington. At 25 years old, he’s hardly too old for their timeline. But then again, the Wizards just traded promising 23-year-old Deni Avdija for picks, and it’s easy to fantasize about what Kispert would look like in a better offensive ecosystem (if his defense can hold up). It might not be long before national audiences can see Kispert’s rack attacks for themselves.

OG Anunoby (New York)

Transition monster

Anunoby is rightly known as the ultimate 3-and-D player. He’s one of the league’s most versatile and effective defenders, and he’s hit 41 percent or better from the corners in each of the last five seasons.

But like the best role players, the scarf aficionado has other talents that aren’t as celebrated. Most saliently, Anunoby is a bullet train on the break.

Per Synergy, Anunoby led the league with 1.45 points per transition possession (min. 100 possessions). That’s not a massive outlier, either, as he was 27th the year prior and seventh in 2021-22.

Anunoby never wastes a fast break. He posted a mere 5.0% turnover rate in the open court, one of the lowest marks in the league. He also gets a jumpstart on the opposition thanks to his numerous steals and deflections. It’s a lot easier to dunk without any defenders in the way:

Anunoby will hit the occasional four-on-three triple, but most of his success came at the rim, as he shot 73 percent on transition twos – higher than LeBron James or Giannis Antetokounmpo. He has a high motor and uses his robust frame to blast through backpedaling defenders at the rim.

The Knicks’ strength has never been first-shot offense. A full season of Anunoby’s transition terror should juice their attack in a small but meaningful way.

Tyrese Maxey (Philadelphia)

Turnover avoidance

A big reason for Maxey’s offensive success (and the love advanced metrics have for his game) is his ability to limit mistakes.

Maxey has always been stingy with the ball, but it’s much easier to avoid turnovers as a play-finisher than as a playmaker. Maxey’s fourth year in the league was his first full season as the point guard (his stint in 2021-22 was interrupted by the Harden trade), and it proved wildly successful. The Most Improved Player posted the lowest turnover rate of any point guard who played real minutes (and one of the lowest marks in the entire league) by only giving it to the other team on 6.6 percent of his used possessions.

Some turnovers are a natural result of aggression, and too few can indicate a player playing too conservatively. That’s not the case here. Maxey is more than willing to throw high-risk, high-reward passes in traffic, because in Maxey’s case, they’re simply high-reward:

Maxey was doing all this despite being the focal point of the opponent’s perimeter defense. His top matchups included turnover-forcing machines like Dejounte Murray, OG Anunoby, Alex Caruso, and Jalen Suggs. And yet, the ball was always safe in his hands.

Maxey posted nine games with 20-plus points, 5-plus assists, and zero turnovers, tied with Tyrese Haliburton (must be something in the name!) and Jalen Brunson for most in the league. He was the main reason the 76ers had the Association’s lowest turnover rate.

Avoiding turnovers is the easiest way to generate offense and bolster defense; even a bad shot at least has a slight chance of going in or creating an offensive rebound, and limiting opponents’ fast breaks forces them into more difficult halfcourt possessions. No, it’s not thrilling to look at, but the importance of turnover avoidance can’t be overstated, particularly for a high-workload point guard.

Jalen Suggs (Orlando)

QB outlet passes

Jalen Suggs popped like a balloon in a tack factory last season, posting career bests in points, three-pointers made, blocks, and steals as he made the All-Defensive 2nd Team. The Magic showed their faith in him by not signing another point guard this offseason, signaling their intent to put more playmaking duties on Suggs’ to-do list.

To this point, Suggs hasn’t been much of an initiator at the NBA level. Last year, five Magicians had a better assist rate, and the starters’ offense typically ran through Paolo Banchero and Franz Wagner first. But there’s one trick that Suggs pulls off better than any of his teammates: throwing touchdowns.

Suggs was the first Minnesota athlete to be named Mr. Basketball and Mr. Football in the same year, and the former quarterback still shows off his laser, rocket arm whenever he sees a chance. Full-court passes, either one-armed or two, are consistently delivered on time and on target. This one, placed right in the Banchero’s bread basket, beat the halftime buzzer. Watch how Suggs directs Banchero exactly like the QB he used to be:

This throw is even more impressive, and I’ve been waiting to exhume it from my notes for months. The powerful side-arm delivery is a good reminder that although Jalen Suggs is short for a basketball player, he’s an inch taller than Patrick Mahomes:

Sure, Gary Harris bobbles the catch, looking like every Kansas City route-runner not dating Taylor Swift. Suggs’ ability to read the coverage still impresses.

There are other players famous for their outlet passes. Jokic and Kevin Love, in particular, are renowned for these sort of plays, and Tyrese Haliburton and Luka Doncic like long-range hit-aheads, too. But Suggs throws bombs as well as anyone. Hopefully, he’ll have a chance to do so more often this season as he assumes a prominent playmaking role.

Thanks for reading! If you enjoyed this post, I’ve collected 10 more players with a surprising skill (including the league’s boldest halfcourt shot-taker).

This article originally appeared on Hoops Hype: Victor Wembanyama and five other NBA players with a surprising skill