Victor Wembanyama is already terrifying. He could stagnate for the rest of his NBA career and still strike fear into the hearts of every opponent seeing the San Antonio Spurs looming on the calendar.
(Spoiler alert: He's not going to stagnate.)
Not only do we have to account for the idea that he might grow to become an 8-footer by the time you're done reading this paragraph, but he's already doing things on the hardwood that were previously unfathomable. Who else can complete an alley-oop with his feet scraping the ground, stifle an opposing center's shot like they're a kid playing against an adult in the driveway, and hit a step-back, ankle-breaking triple while drawing a foul?
Wembanyama managed all of that in his first game of the 2025-26 campaign, dropping an absurd 40 points, 15 rebounds, and three blocks in a 125-92 victory over the Dallas Mavericks. LeBron James comparisons are flying willy-nilly. He's routinely called an alien, as if Space Jam didn't disprove the idea of extraterrestrials being superior to humanity on a basketball court. He's breaking our collective brains with a dizzying deluge of unexplored athletic feats.
And he's just getting started. As a reminder, he won't even turn 22 years old until January.
That's part of why Blake Griffin, no stranger to physics-defying plays himself and as close to an expert as can be found about the bounds of human possibility in the Association, is convinced Wembanyama will be blowing our minds with even more dunks in the not-too-distant future.
Blake Griffin hinted at the next evolution for Victor Wembanyama
Appearing on The Zach Lowe Show (segment starts at 37:30), the former NBA high-flier shared a thought that should have the rest of the NBA quivering in its metaphorical high-tops.
"Two years from now, when his hips get even stronger, when he gets a little bit more to his upper-body frame, now some of these spin moves that he's doing — you know, he's spinning, and he's still getting up there; he's still finishing over or slinging out a pass — I feel like in two years, three years ... those are all going to be dunks," Griffin explained with a twinge of disbelief in his voice. "His ceiling, he's already so good, and his ceiling, I don't know where it is."
You and us both, Blake. You and us both.
Wembanyama clearly has an impressive work ethic, one that was on full display throughout the offseason as he — and this is an end to a sentence that, much like what he does on the court, would've been previously unthinkable — trained with everyone from Hakeem Olajuwon and Kevin Garnett to monks at a Shaolin temple. It stands to reason that he's going to keep getting stronger.
In fact, we've already seen tantalizing teases of that future. This dunk over 6-foot-8 forward Isaiah Jackson during the preseason couldn't have looked more like vintage Shaquille O'Neal if Wembanyama had been wearing a purple-and-gold No. 34 jersey as an homage.
Victor Wembanyama muscling his way to a dunk 😳
(h/t @BalaPattySZN)pic.twitter.com/euMLhOm5XC
— Fullcourtpass (@Fullcourtpass) October 13, 2025
The stakes were even lower for this one, but poor Luke Kornet must've felt like he was hit in the chest by a (Shaq) Diesel truck.
VICTOR WEMBANYAMA BULLIED LUKE KORNET, THEN THREW DOWN A-LIKE DUNK! 💪
Wemby’s coming different in 2025-26! pic.twitter.com/NDeHoAJtGR
— Courtside Buzz (@CourtsideBuzzX) October 5, 2025
If Griffin's assessment is wrong, it's only because he got the timeline incorrect. We may not need to wait two or three years to see Wembanya's physical dunking prowess shoot through the rafters.
Victor Wembanyama is ready to ascend one more leaderboard
The Spurs' in-house MVP candidate already finds himself near the top of virtually every statistical leaderboard under the sun, but one has eluded him.
Per Stathead, he finished "just" 22nd in dunks made during the 2024-25 season, down from eighth in his rookie campaign.
Availability was a big reason as thoracic outlet syndrome (TOS) cut his year short, but the per-game numbers don't move him too much closer to a podium position. Among the 88 players who recorded at least 40 slams last year, Wembanyama's average tally (2.5) still trailed Mark Williams (2.6), Nic Claxton (2.7), Aaron Gordon (2.7), Daniel Gafford (2.7), Jalen Duren (2.8), Evan Mobley (2.9), Anthony Davis (2.9), Dereck Lively II (3.0), Rudy Gobert (3.4), and Giannis Antetokounmpo (3.5).
Of course, he completed seven dunks in his 2025-26 debut — the second-highest tally of his young career, behind only a nine-dunk showcase against the Atlanta Hawks in January 2024, Much like everything else about his game, he seems in the process of breaking through into a new stratosphere.
What was that word again?
Oh yeah: terrifying.