The Spurs lost Victor Wembanyama to his first career ejection after he received a flagrant foul 2 following an elbow to the neck and jaw of Timberwolves big man Naz Reid, writes Michael C. Wright of ESPN.com. The incident occurred with 8:39 remaining the second quarter of Sunday’s Game 4 in Minnesota (YouTube link), which the Wolves went on to win to even the series at two games apiece.
According to Wright, Wembanyama was initially called for an offensive foul but it was upgraded to a flagrant 2, which comes with an automatic ejection, upon review. The star center seemed confused about the penalty on the broadcast, appearing to ask teammate Harrison Barnes what it meant, Wright notes.
The NBA’s Defensive Player of the Year only had four points and four rebounds in 12 minutes after dominating and joining exclusive company in Game 3 with 39 points (on 13-of-18 shooting), 15 rebounds and five blocks in 37 minutes.
The incident will be reviewed further by the league office to determine if additional punishment may be warranted.
After the five-point loss, Spurs head coach Mitch Johnson defended the 22-year-old big man, according to Tom Orsborn of The San Antonio Express-News (Twitter links). While Johnson didn’t condone the elbow to Reid, he said Wembanyama was defending himself.
“It’s getting to a point that if the people that are in charge of controlling the game and protecting the physicality of the game don’t do that, then at some point he’s going to have to protect himself,” Johnson said. “… He’s going to have to protect himself if they’re not…It’s disgusting….I just think that the amount of physicality that people play with him at some level you have to protect yourself.”
Johnson added that he thought a possible suspension for Wembanyama “would be ridiculous.”
“There was zero intent,” he said (Twitter link via Orsborn).
Absolutely rigged league. Truly pathetic.
Stop sounding like Skip Bayless. Flagrant 2 was the right call if you watched what Wemby did
Really? I’m Skip Bayless now for saying a guy who has NEVER been ejected before and is known as an ethical player, gets ejected for the first time, in the playoffs? In the playoffs. Its the playoffs – the NBA playoffs are always at their best when the refs put their whistles away. When they make calls that change the outcome, everyone loses. Draymond should have never been suspended, Wemby did not deserve the ejection. Anyone who disagrees doesn’t like NBA basketball.
This was one of the most obvious Flagrant 2 ejections of the last decade. Watch the slow motion clip. This was 100% intentional and met every criteria for Flagrant 2, which is an automatic ejection. FF2 is “Unnecessary and excessive contact committed by a player against an opponent”. You are blind if you didn’t see this. Wemby was fouled beforehand and that should have been called. But he wound up and followed through with an elbow to an opponent’s face and jaw.
You don’t have to be contrarian on everything and this has zero to do with Draymond. No idea why you are bringing him up.
Skip Bayless recently ranked LeBron #9.
Don’t call the man crazy for wanting physicality brought back to the game. You can both be right here.