Victor Wembanyama NBA Debut: Spurs vs. Mavericks Odds, Lines & Props

Wembanyama opened with lofty over/under totals for his debut.

• Points: 17.5
• Rebounds: 6.5
• Blocks: 2.5
• Steals: 0.5
• Threes: 1.5
• Turnovers: 1.5

Lines from DraftKings Sportsbook. Subject to change.

Even before his much-anticipated NBA debut, Wembanyama took the court in early October in the Spurs’ preseason, when the No. 1 pick scored 20 points with five rebounds.

Wembanyama opened as an underdog to score 20+ in his NBA debut. Only five of the last 20 players drafted first overall scored at least 20 points in their first official game.

Long before Wembanyama took the court for his NBA debut, oddsmakers had already priced the Spurs rookie as the clear-cut favorite to win one of the league’s most coveted awards, with an outside chance of multiple trophies in his debut campaign.

He entered the season as the runaway favorite to win NBA Rookie of the Year and a long shot to win MVP. He also opened among the favorites to win Defensive Player of the Year even before stepping foot in a real NBA game.

There is one potential drawback to betting on Wembanyama to win any of these awards: Will he play enough games?

The NBA’s new rules regarding awards eligibility means the rookie will have to play at least 20 minutes in at least 65 games (with minor exceptions), which could be tricky depending on the Spurs’ plans for their franchise star.

If Wembanyama gets hurt at any point during this season – which profiles as a rebuilding year for San Antonio – coach Gregg Popovich could opt to shut down the generational prospect to avoid a long-term injury.

Even if he remains healthy, there’s a chance the team shelves him once the playoffs are beyond reach, which could prematurely end his chances of winning an award.

Rookie of the Year

Wembanyama opened as a -130 favorite to win NBA Rookie of the Year shortly after being drafted first overall, and he entered the 2023-24 season dealing at that same price on at least one online betting site.

Wembanyama was the first player to enter the season as the odds-on favorite to win NBA Rookie of the Year since Kevin Durant (-200) in 2007, when the former SuperSonics star ran away with the award averaging 20.3 points as a 19-year old.

Only three other players – Scoot Henderson (+240), Chet Holmgren (+280) and Brandon Miller (+1600) – entered the season with odds shorter than 25/1 to win Rookie of the Year, and only two of them are true rookies. Holmgren missed the entire 2022-23 season with injury.

Most Valuable Player

The Spurs rookie entered the season as a 90/1 long shot to win MVP at DraftKings, ranking him inside the top 40 to win the award. He had better odds to win MVP than the likes of All-Stars Tyrese Haliburton and Darius Garland and recent No. 1 picks Cade Cunningham and Paolo Banchero.

Even the greatest players of all-time have fallen short of that lofty goal in their debut season, as only two players – Wilt Chamberlain (1959-60) and Wes Unseld (1968-69) – have ever taken home the NBA MVP trophy in their rookie year.

Defensive Player of the Year

Entering the season, Wembanyama was listed at 15/1 to win Defensive Player of the Year at DraftKings – the ninth-shortest odds of any player to win the award.

Wembanyama slotted just behind Brook Lopez, who finished second in voting last year, and three-time winner Rudy Gobert. He also boasted better odds than former DPOY winners Draymond Green, Marcus Smart and Kawhi Leonard.

Of course, that doesn’t mean Wembanyama is already a better defender than those players. But he could be. Standing at 7-foot-5 in shoes, the 19-year-old Frenchman has the potential to defend the paint at an elite level while also being a suffocating perimeter defender.

Born in the commune of Nanterre northwest of Paris, Wembanyama became an internet sensation for his astonishing blend of size, skill and grace.

According to ESPN’s Brian Windhorst, the one-of-a-kind prospect is 7-foot-5 with shoes on. It was also reported that he has an eight-foot wingspan, which would tie Kevin McHale for the third-longest wingspan in league history. Only Manute Bol (8-foot-6) and Tacko Fall (8-foot-2) had longer reaches.

Wembanyama could still be growing, but at 7-foot-5 he would be one of the tallest players in history. He’s just one inch shorter than Yao Ming, the tallest player in the NBA Hall of Fame.

Despite his enormous size, he is not an unathletic back-to-the-basket big, nor a clumsy giant that trips over his own feet. He takes defenders off the dribble, creates his own shot with nifty footwork and pulls up over defenders similar to Durant – who is also the last player to enter his debut season as an odds-on favorite to win ROY.

Even as Wembanyama hype reached a fever pitch, oddsmakers were clearly more skeptical of the Spurs’ outlook entering the 2023-24 NBA season.

Ahead of the season opener, San Antonio was dealing as a distant 500/1 long shot to win the NBA Finals – tied for the third-longest odds on the board – with the longest odds to win the Western Conference at 250/1.

Even a more modest goal of making the playoffs was seen as wishful thinking for the Spurs, who entered the season with 9/1 odds to reach the postseason and 6/1 odds to make the play-in round. The team’s win total was a meager 29.5, among the lowest on the board, and San Antonio was +475 to finish with the worst record in the NBA.

Spurs Preseason Futures Odds

• To win the NBA championship: +50000
• To win the Western Conference: +25000
• To win the Southwest Division: +4500
• To make the NBA postseason: +900
• To make the play-in tournament: +600
• To finish with NBA’s worst record: +475

As the anticipation was building ahead of Wembanyama’s official NBA debut, fans were left combing through his stats in the preseason and summer league for a taste of what to expect when he finally took the court for an official NBA game.

All of those stats told the same story: Wembanyama has elite potential as a rookie on both ends of the court, and there’s no telling what his upside could be even in his first season.

Preseason Numbers

Even before Wembanyama played first official NBA game, the Spurs rookie was wreaking havoc in his first taste of league action.

In four preseason games, Wembanyama averaged 19.3 points, 4.8 rebounds and 1.5 assists on 50.9% shooting from the floor, adding 2.8 blocks and 1.0 steals per game. He did all of that in just 20.9 minutes per game.

If you took his stats and stretched them across 36 minutes, he would have averaged a whopping 33.2 points and a ridiculous 4.7 blocks per game – both of which would approach the all-time rookie records across a full season.

Fans and bettors alike received a sneak peek of Wembanyama in action during the 2023 NBA Summer League, which was his first time sharing the court with fellow NBA prospects since being drafted first overall in June.

In his debut against the Hornets, the No. 1 pick struggled, shooting only 2-of-13 from the field to finish with nine points. Wembanyama also grabbed eight rebounds in the contest. His defense was elite, blocking five shots in his first unofficial taste of NBA action.

In his second Summer League game against the Trail Blazers, Wembanyama demonstrated his offensive prowess, scoring 27 points and grabbing 12 rebounds in a loss for San Antonio.

After that game, the Spurs opted to shut down their prized asset for the remainder of Summer League to avoid any injury risk, which could be a sign of things to come in the 2023-24 NBA season.

In June 2023, the Spurs drafted Wembanyama with the first overall pick. This came after NBA evaluators labeled him as the greatest prospect in NBA draft history.

To complement praise from front office members and reporters, James – who was once considered a generational prospect in his own right – called Wembanyama “an alien.”

Wembanyama was a near gambling lock (to use a popular sports betting term) to cross the Barclays Center stage before all of his draftmates in 2023. At NBA sportsbooks, he was a -20000 betting odds favorite to be the first draft pick in the ‘23 class.

He opened at -2000 in late 2022, but as the weeks and months passed, it was clear there was no stopping Wembanyama’s momentum. As his odds skyrocketed to -8000, some oddsmakers no longer allowed fans to wager on any other individual player. Instead, you could only take “the field” against Wembanyama going No. 1.

By spring, Wembanyama was -20000. To win $100, sports bettors would have had to risk $20,000. There was no point in betting on anyone other than the Frenchman to go first overall, right? Well, some sports bettors were essentially betting on a Wembanyama injury – though even that might not have stopped the Spurs from taking him first.

Early in 2023, Scoot Henderson (+3000 to go first overall) was the only other player worth discussing, even though his odds were long. Henderson ended up going third, with Alabama’s Brandon Miller selected second.

Betting odds of -20000 to go No. 1 had an implied probability of 99.5%. Wembanyama at No. 1 was the biggest foregone conclusion since James in 2023.

Richard Jefferson, a 19-year NBA veteran who won a championship with James, said his former teammate would’ve gone second in a draft with Wembanyama. NBA franchises salivated at the prospect of landing Wembanyama in the draft. The NBA Draft Lottery took place May 16, 2023, with the Spurs hitting the jackpot.

During an interview, Houston Rockets owner Tilman Fertitta said to “pray for Victor (Wembanyama).” Houston had the worst record in the NBA when he made the comment, and the Rockets finished tied with the Spurs for the second-worst regular season record.

Unfortunately for Fertitta, but fortunately for the competitive integrity of the NBA, draft position is not determined solely by the regular season. Instead, teams are assigned a spot in the draft through a lottery instituted in 1985.

Tanking to Draft Wembanyama?

The 14 teams not qualifying for the playoffs are in the draft lottery. The teams with the three worst records have a 14% chance of the first pick, and the odds lengthen from there.

The lottery determines the first four positions on the draft board, and the remaining 10 spots are filled out in reverse order of record. That ensures that the team with the worst regular-season record gets no worse than the fifth pick, although that could be the difference between a franchise-changing star and a solid role player.

Before the 2020 NBA Draft, the team with the worst record had the best odds of landing the No. 1 pick, and only the top three draft positions were determined by the lottery. Changes were made to discourage teams from “tanking,” or intentionally losing regular-season games. Still, there were allegations of tanking for the Frenchman.

The Rockets, Spurs, Pistons and Hornets were the favorites to land the top pick in the draft. Their records at the end of the 2022-23 NBA regular season:

• Pistons: 17-65
• Rockets: 22-60
• Spurs: 22-60
• Hornets: 27-55

Only the three worst teams have a 14% chance of the first pick, as the fourth-worst team’s chances drop to 12.5%. Of those four teams, only one (Detroit in 2021) has had the first overall pick in the last 20 years.

The 2007-08 Chicago Bulls were the luckiest team in NBA draft history. Having finished 11th in the Eastern Conference with a 33-49 record, the Bulls had a 1.7% chance of landing the No. 1 pick. They defied the odds and selected future MVP and Chicago native Derrick Rose.

Photo by Thearon W. Henderson/Getty Images