When the replay of Victor Wembanyama hyper-extending his knee against the Knicks on New Year’s Eve was shown, I felt like the loneliest member of the “Victor will stay healthy like Kareem did” fan club.  The highlight of the evening was when Victor came back out of the locker room to cheer on his teammates down the stretch.  The dude really likes the team and really cares about winning — a great combination. And for those of us watching at home, we knew the Spurs doctors would not have allowed him to go back into the arena if he had a serious injury — and his teammates did too.  His presence may have just been the moment of zen that allowed the Spurs on the floor to stop thinking about whether their best player was seriously hurt and instead focus on the task at hand.   And for the purposes of this post, the good news about Victor’s health allows me to write about things I am looking forward to in 2026, starting off with Victor’s return to the court in a week or so, instead of months. Here are some of the other things I look forward to tracking: Hawks losses and Clippers wins.  The Spurs own the right to swap first round picks with the Atlanta Hawks in the 2026 draft, so every Hawks loss improves the chances that the draft pick will be a good one. The Hawks are 16-19 on the first day of 2026, on the edge of the Play-In race.  Unfortunately, the teams behind them in the Eastern Conference, with the exception of the Bucks, are all pretty lousy, so the Hawks are likely to finish 9th or 10th. Still, that would probably translate into something like the 12th pick in what is supposed to be a strong draft.  Recent 12th picks have included the Pacers’ Tyrese Haliburton and Thunder’s Jalen Williams, while some guy with the odd name of Kawhi was a 15th pick a while back. The Spurs would also like the Clippers to do well, as distasteful as that may be to some Spurs fans because the Clippers have some guy with the odd name of Kawhi.  We should want the Clippers to win some because OKC owns the Clippers pick.  The Clippers have been dreadful, so much so that they are 12-21 after winning six in a row. Although I cannot actually root for the Clippers to win, I am OK with checking ESPN after the games have been played to see if the Clippers have diminished the quality of the OKC 2026 draft pick. The Spurs’ young guards learn to shoot.  Everyone, including me, loves the Spurs’ young guards, Stephon Castle and Dylan Harper.  They play hard, defend well, have mature and unselfish games and attack the rim with abandon  But they cannot (yet) shoot from distance.  Castle is at 27% from three, Harper is at 26%.  That the Spurs have the third best record in the league with two of their three guards below 30% from three is a testament to how good they are at all the other things.  But they simply need to get better for the team to reach its peak.  The Spurs cannot count on Julian Chamgagnie to make 11 threes every night.  As proof, in all the games I have played over the years, I only made 11 threes twice. (You can look up “humble brag” in the dictionary.) 65 games. In all its wisdom, the NBA decided two years ago that players cannot qualify for MVP, All-NBA and other regular season awards unless they play at least 65 games.  I just learned that players must play at least 20 minutes in those 65 games, although they can have a couple of “near misses” of 15-19 minutes — the rule is designed to prevent guys from starting the game and then subbing out at the first whistle.  The minimum game rule may prevent players like Victor from Defensive Player of the Year (even though he is) and Nikola Jokic from MVP consideration.  In related news, the Joker is on pace to be the first player ever to lead the league in rebounds and assists — if he recovers from his knee injury soon enough to hit the 65 game threshold. Leading the league in those two stats would be like a baseball player leading the league in home runs and being a Cy Young quality starting pitcher.  Impossible, right? The Celtics and Jason Tatum.  After Tatum tore his Achilles in the playoffs last year, Celtics management decided to take a “gap year” and get ready for the 2026-27 season when Tatum would be able to return, but the players had different ideas. Indeed, if not for the Spurs’ surprising start, the Celtics’ success thus far would be the lead story. Despite losing Tatum and getting rid of Jrue Holiday and Kristaps Porzingis, the Celtics are 20-12 and in third place in the East. It will be interesting to see if they can keep it up, though playing mostly Eastern Conference teams should help. (We want them to beat up the Hawks whenever they play.) By the way, there are rumors that Tatum may make it back to before the end of the regular season — which could mean that the Celtics could win the East in their “gap year”.  Not 73 wins. Will the OKC Thunder break the all-time record of 73 wins?  Not if they have to play the Spurs many more times. (They play them two more times.)  Happy New Year to all.  Most of all, I am looking forward to seeing what the Spurs can accomplish in the rest of the season, we are so far ahead of schedule.  As a reminder, in my annual over/under column before the season, I wrote this: San Antonio Spurs Last season’s wins: 34Vegas over/under: 43.5 I had forgotten that last season’s Spurs beat out only two Western Conference teams – the Jazz and the Pelicans.   Losing your best player in February has a tendency to hurt a team’s win total. Because that player is back, and very good, and for other reasons everyone reading this knows about, Vegas has projected the Spurs to improve more in 2025-26 than every other team except one (a team which we have not yet mentioned). Who am I to disagree? I am also contractually obligated to say OVER, and I know better than to breach my contract before “the powers that be” decide on my Christmas bonus. OVER, OVER, OVER. On the first day of 2026, the Spurs are 24-9.  Which means they need to win 20 games in 2026 to be OVER, OVER, OVER the Vegas projection.  I will be very unhappy if the Spurs only win 20 more games — that would be a 20-29 record over the last 50 games.  I should have gone to Vegas. ...read more read less