Nikola Joki\u0107 has taken home three of the last five MVP awards and finished in second place in the voting the two years he didn’t win the trophy during that span, but Victor Wembanyama does not believe the Denver Nuggets star is the NBA’s best player.<\/p>\n
“I think Joki\u0107 is the best offensive player,” the San Antonio Spurs big man told ESPN’s Malika Andrews in an interview that aired on Tuesday’s NBA Today. “I don’t think he’s the best player. It’s hard to say. I think it was between Giannis and Shai. When I come back on the court, I think it will be me.”<\/p>\n
There have long been discussions<\/a> about Joki\u0107’s defense, and part of it may be that he is essentially flawless on offense and in other areas of the court. If there is any room for improvement, it is on that side of the ball.<\/p>\n That seems to be the case this season, as opponents are shooting 3.6 percent<\/a> better from the field than their normal averages when he guards them, per NBA.com.\u00a0<\/p>\n Still, Joki\u0107’s overall impact on the floor is impossible to ignore, and he topped the preseason ranking<\/a> of players across a number of publications<\/a> heading into the 2025-26 campaign. It is a surprise when Joki\u0107 doesn’t get a triple-double at this point, as he is averaging 29.8 points, 12.4 rebounds and 10.8 assists a night.<\/p>\n His rebounding and assist numbers are best in the league, further underscoring his ability to impact the game in so many ways as a center.<\/p>\n But Wembanyama led the league in blocks per game in each of his first two seasons and clearly values defense when having these discussions since he mentioned Giannis Antetokounmpo and himself. Giving the nod to the reigning league MVP who just led the Oklahoma City Thunder to a title in Shai Gilgeous-Alexander is also understandable, even if the guard isn’t going to win a Defensive Player of the Year.<\/p>\n The self-belief from the Spurs star that he will eventually be the league’s best player is notable and also fully defensible.<\/p>\n After all, he is just 21 years old and already has a resume that includes a Rookie of the Year, All-Star selection and two block titles. He is a matchup nightmare with the ability to shoot from beyond the arc, attack off the bounce and dominate the paint all while anchoring San Antonio’s defensive efforts on the other side.<\/p>\n It might be Wembanyama’s league soon enough, even with so many other stars such as Joki\u0107 and others playing at a high level.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Nikola Joki\u0107 has taken home three of the last five MVP awards and finished in second place in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":352602,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[557],"tags":[64,63,590,85],"class_list":["post-352601","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-nba","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/352601","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=352601"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/352601\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/352602"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=352601"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=352601"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=352601"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}