By Michael C. Wright | ESPN, 2025-01-22 20:00:00
由生成式人工智能翻译，译文内容可能不准确或不完整，以原文为准。
1 月 15 日深夜 ，托尼·帕克(Tony Parker)正走在圣安东尼奥弗罗斯特银行中心的走廊上。他紫红色的飞行员夹克袖子卷了起来，每走几步就会停下来，沉浸在球迷们对这位法国篮球史上最伟大球员的敬意之中。
这位名人堂控球后卫和四届 NBA 总冠军代表着圣安东尼奥马刺队和法国的过去。
就在走廊几英尺远的地方，维克托·文班亚马(Victor Wembanyama)——这支球队、法国篮球乃至整个 NBA 的现在和未来——正在更衣室里等待下半场的指示。上半场他帮助圣安东尼奥以 63-51 领先孟菲斯灰熊队，并送出了 8 次盖帽。
领先优势没能保持，文班亚马和马刺队最终因为缺乏经验而以 14 分之差输掉了比赛。两晚后，他们再次在主场输给了灰熊——这次灰熊队缺少了球星后卫贾·莫兰特——以 28 分之差落败。
尽管这位 21 岁的球员的新秀赛季只有 22 场胜利，而且俱乐部最近也陷入了困境——在过去的七场比赛中输掉了六场——但在即将于周四对阵印第安纳步行者队的 2025 年 NBA 巴黎赛之前，他对马刺队的信心依然坚定。
“球队已经一次又一次地证明，他们愿意并且正在做正确的事情，”文班亚马在马刺队 140-112 输球后说道。“最重要的是信任和沟通。这是一种平衡，也是（双方）多年来保持这种平衡的意愿。这终将得到回报。”
在选秀前，文班亚马不仅被认为是毫无争议的状元，而且是一位划时代的球员，他多次表示圣安东尼奥正是他想去的地方。
他有充分的理由做出这样的选择，考虑到圣安东尼奥重视国际球探的良好记录，他们三十年来培养了来自世界各地（包括法国）的球星，以及五个 NBA 总冠军和连续 22 次季后赛之旅，这些都点缀着一个在现代 NBA 历史上无与伦比的多时代王朝。
因此，当马刺队在 2023 年 NBA 选秀大会上做出选择时，梦想变成了现实。
“这是我能要求的最好的事情，”文班亚马说。“最伟大的球队，最棒的文化，最棒的球迷。”
帕克的经历则有所不同：他在 2001 年以第 28 顺位被马刺队选中，当时在 NBA 选秀中选择一名法国控球后卫是闻所未闻的。
法国同胞鲍里斯·迪奥(Boris Diaw)曾在 2000 年 FIBA 18 岁以下锦标赛上与帕克并肩作战，并在 2014 年与圣安东尼奥一起夺得 NBA 总冠军。他在 2019 年帕克的球衣退役仪式上讲述了一个故事，概括了文班亚马现在所经历的氛围。
迪奥回忆说，当时他还没有成为 NBA 球员，而当时 19 岁的马刺队新秀帕克邀请他去格雷格·波波维奇(Gregg Popovich)教练家吃圣诞晚餐。
迪奥说，他觉得很奇怪，像波波维奇这样地位的教练会在圣诞节邀请他的一年级后卫吃饭，更奇怪的是，这位新秀还可以邀请自己的客人。故事是这样的，在那顿晚餐上，在主菜和甜点之间，帕克和波波维奇消失了。
“我到房子里四处寻找，”迪奥说。“然后我看到波波维奇正在和托尼一起观看前一天晚上的比赛录像。波波维奇正在对托尼大喊大叫。
“我想，‘哇哦。’所以，在同一个晚上，你可以拥有家庭的氛围，所有的爱和关怀，同时也在圣诞节晚上关心着如何让托尼成为一名更好的球员。那时我就知道托尼被照顾得很好，他的职业生涯将会很伟大。”
二十多年后，这种文化依然存在——为了下一代。
目前的 NBA 格局中有创纪录的 14 名法国球员，包括马刺队的两名球员：文班亚马和西迪·西索科(Sidy Cissoko)，后者是 2023 年选秀大会的第 44 顺位新秀。
2024 年的选秀大会上，法国的扎卡里·里萨切尔(Zaccharie Risacher)、亚历山大·萨尔(Alexandre Sarr)和蒂迪亚内·萨劳恩(Tidjane Salaun)这三名球员进入了前十名，这标志着美国以外的同一国家的三名球员首次在同一届选秀中进入前十名。各支球队在首轮选中了创纪录的四名法国球员，总共五名。
“每次我去一个城市，我都会想，‘哦，天哪，这里有一个法国人，’”华盛顿奇才队前锋比拉尔·库利巴利(Bilal Coulibaly)说道，他是 2023 年的第七顺位新秀，也是文班亚马在法国大都会 92 队的队友。“就好像我们真的做成了一些事。”
波波维奇和马刺队预见到了这一天的到来，这位长期执教的主教练在 11 月轻微中风之前表达了这一点，这次中风让他一直远离球队。多年来，马刺队的阵容中共有七名法国人，其中包括 2013-14 赛季最终举起圣安东尼奥最近一次拉里·奥布莱恩冠军奖杯的三名球员（帕克、迪奥和南多·德科洛(Nando De Colo)，后者在 2014 年 2 月被交易到多伦多猛龙队）。
波波维奇曾在空军学院主修苏联研究，他会说俄语和塞尔维亚语，并且曾在把他带到欧洲各地的军事篮球队打球。波波维奇亲眼目睹了他的欧洲同行所拥有的天赋。
因此，当波波维奇在 20 世纪 80 年代末作为助理教练进入 NBA 时，他惊讶于联盟还没有充分利用欧洲的人才库。波波维奇回忆起，当他去德国科隆考察欧洲锦标赛时，他看到了名人堂教练唐·尼尔森(Don Nelson)，他认为自己正是在正确的地方发现人才。
“人们对欧洲球员抱有偏见，”波波维奇告诉 ESPN。“有点犹豫，因为他们不会防守，不会融入这里，不会喜欢这里。我们和其中一些人交过手，他们都很棒。所以，我知道他们就在那里。他们到处都是。”
现在，大约 30 年后，揭幕战的球员名单上有来自 43 个国家的 125 名国际球员。
布雷特·布朗(Brett Brown)在马刺队工作了十年，分两个阶段，从 2007 年到 2013 年担任助理教练，然后在 2022 年回归。他回忆起几年前的一次晚餐，让他意识到外国出生的球员在 NBA 阵容中已经成为中流砥柱——以及原因。
“我和鲍里斯·迪奥、蒂亚戈·斯普利特(Tiago Splitter)、帕蒂·米尔斯(Patty Mills)、肖恩·马克斯(Sean Marks)、马努·吉诺比利(Manu Ginobili)以及我本人坐在餐桌上，”布朗告诉 ESPN。“我环顾四周，有阿根廷人，有法国人，新西兰人，巴西人，还有澳大利亚人。他们是全球篮球界的重量级人物，是国外的明星。我认为他们从更广阔的视角来看待世界和这项运动。他们看待事物的方式真的不一样。”
对帕克来说这并不容易 。有很多次，作为一名新秀，他会站在淋浴间里，练习结束后——在练习中他忍受了各种各样的谩骂——眼里噙着泪水。他想知道自己是否能够满足这位出了名地严厉的波波维奇，尽管帕克在新秀赛季的五场比赛后就被任命为马刺队的首发控球后卫。
“我开了个玩笑，但这是真的，”波波维奇说。“我应该因为虐待那个孩子而被捕。”
无论如何，帕克在马刺队效力了 17 年，找到了自己的归宿，并创下了球队助攻纪录（6829 次），并在出场次数（1198 场）、得分（18943 分）和抢断（1032 次）方面排名前五。
帕克，六次入选全明星，四次入选 NBA 最佳阵容，成为第一位获得 NBA 总决赛 MVP 的欧洲球员（2007 年）。
“在训练营和最初的几场比赛中，我对他真的很严格，给了他很多东西去思考，很多事情去做，”波波维奇说。“他证明了他有毅力和勇气去做这件事。我把球给了他，说，‘这是你的。你自己看着办。’”
帕克就是这样做的。
“法国篮球就是托尼，”迪奥说。“托尼就是法国篮球。你不可能在不提到托尼的名字的情况下谈论法国篮球。”
这差点就没发生。如果波波维奇一开始就按自己的方式来，也许法国就不会在过去的 18 个赛季中一直是 NBA 中代表人数最多的欧洲国家。
帕克与马刺队的第一次试训给波波维奇留下的印象是，这个法国人“太软弱”了，无法在圣安东尼奥取得成功。帕克在芝加哥参加了一次与马刺队的私人选秀前试训，对手是前管理层员工兰斯·布兰克斯(Lance Blanks)，后者从头到尾都占据着主导地位。
帕克事后冷漠的反应让事情变得更糟。
波波维奇受够了，想放弃他。但萨姆·普雷斯蒂(Sam Presti)，现任俄克拉荷马城雷霆队的执行副总裁兼总经理，阻止了他。普雷斯蒂当时在球探部门为圣安东尼奥的现任首席执行官 R.C. 布福德(R.C. Buford)工作，在 2001 年选秀之前，他花了大量时间研究帕克的比赛。在波波维奇解释了他为什么觉得帕克不适合圣安东尼奥之后，普雷斯蒂剪辑了一盘录像带，逐一解决了教练的每一个担忧。
这说服了波波维奇再给帕克一次试训的机会。这位法国人表现出色。
“R.C. 走在了时代的前面，”帕克在他的球衣退役仪式上说。“他和萨姆·普雷斯蒂。你们在我身上赌了一把。我在与马刺队的第一次试训中表现很糟糕。波波维奇不想听到关于托尼·帕克的消息。他说，‘我受够了。我想要另一个控球后卫。’而 R.C.，伙计，你一直在和波波维奇谈话，一直在给他看录像。我很幸运你给了我第二次试训的机会，我能够向你展示我想成为一名马刺队的控球后卫。”
对于文班亚马来说，带领一支球队开始下一阶段的进化，风险甚至更高，这支球队刚刚建成了一座耗资 5 亿美元的新训练设施，并计划在市中心建造一座新的球馆。帕克在圣安东尼奥开启了国际化运动，而马刺队需要文班亚马将它带入一个新的时代——一个再次持续统治的时代。
在他被选中两天后 ，文班亚马坐在圣安东尼奥的讲台上，他是最新的让 NBA 着迷的国际天才，也是最新的身披黑色和银色马刺队队服的法国新秀。
在他旁边放着一个 58 英寸高的乐高埃菲尔铁塔复制品。
一名球队工作人员花了 15 个小时才拼好了这套 10001 块的积木，一位马刺队的高管在去年冬天以 629.99 美元的价格购买了这套积木，当时他并不知道俱乐部会在几个月后用状元签选中文班亚马——也不知道这个法国人对乐高积木的热爱。
球队承认，早在四年之前，他们就开始幻想选中文班亚马了。
“这太棒了，”明尼苏达森林狼队中锋鲁迪·戈贝尔(Rudy Gobert)说道，他是一位四届 NBA 最佳防守球员，在法国圣康坦长大。“这对所有铺平道路的人，第一批人，像托尼（帕克）、鲍里斯（迪奥）这样的第一代人来说都很好。所有这些人都向美国人，向 NBA 展示了，他们可以来自欧洲，在这个联盟中占据主导地位，成为这个联盟中的伟大球员。现在，我们的孩子们不再害怕梦想 NBA。所有有勇气梦想这一点的孩子们都可以拥有他们可以仰望的榜样，然后尝试追随他们的道路。”
在 2024 年选秀大会之后，有五名来自法国的球员进入了 NBA 阵容，还有四名——诺兰·特拉奥雷(Nolan Traore)、诺亚·埃森格(Noa Essengue)、琼·贝林格(Joan Beringer)和诺亚·彭达(Noah Penda)——应该会在 2025 年的选秀大会上占据重要位置。
“我们热爱篮球，”奇才队的库利巴利说。“一开始是足球。然后看到所有像托尼·帕克、鲍里斯·迪奥这样的伟大球员都获得了总冠军戒指等等。我们就会想，‘哦，天哪，我也想这样做。’”
文班亚马说，他相信他的国家还有更大的发展空间，尤其是在国际舞台上。他在八月份的巴黎奥运会上代表法国队参加了与美国队的金牌争夺战，最终输掉了比赛。
“能够成为这股球员浪潮的一部分，我感到非常自豪，”文班亚马说。“但我认为我们还没有达到目标。我们现在缺少的是法国篮球的国际冠军。这是一次伟大的冒险。但法国篮球现在还没有发挥出它的全部潜力。”
他也没有。
不过，他相信圣安东尼奥的计划，即围绕他建立一支长期赢球的球队。
“我对我们现有的团队、球队中的人以及从第一天起就与我共事的人充满信心，”文班亚马说。“我们知道这个赛季不会一帆风顺。会有起有落。这并不容易。我们不可能在一个赛季里取得 82 胜 0 负的战绩。我们会有连败的时候。但我对我的队友们的意志力非常有信心。
“长期目标永远不会受到质疑。”
点击查看原文：How the Spurs paved the way for Victor Wembanyama's NBA career
How the Spurs paved the way for Victor Wembanyama’s NBA career
IT’S LATE IN the evening on Jan. 15, and Tony Parker is walking down a hall at Frost Bank Center in San Antonio. The sleeves of his mauve bomber jacket rolled up, he stops every few steps to soak in adulation from fans paying homage to the greatest player in French basketball history.
The Hall of Fame point guard and four-time NBA champion represents the past for both the San Antonio Spurs and the country of France.
Just a few feet down the hall, Victor Wembanyama – the present and future of the franchise, French basketball and possibly the entire NBA – waits for second-half instructions in the locker room after blocking eight shots in helping San Antonio build a 63-51 halftime lead over the Memphis Grizzlies.
The lead doesn’t last, as Wembanyama and the Spurs fall victim to their inexperience and lose by 14. Two nights later, they again lose at home to the Grizzlies – this time without star guard Ja Morant – by 28.
Still, the 21-year-old’s faith in the Spurs franchise remains as solid as ever, despite a 22-win rookie campaign and the club’s most recent struggles – losers of six of their past seven games – headed into the 2025 NBA Paris Games, which will tip off Thursday against the Indiana Pacers.
“The organization has proven over and over they’re willing and they’re doing the right things,” Wembanyama said Friday after the Spurs’ 140-112 loss. “The most important thing is trust and also communication. It’s a balance and the will [between both parties] to keep that balance over the years. This is what’s going to pay off.”
During the predraft process, in which Wembanyama was not only considered the consensus No. 1 pick but a generational prospect, he professed on multiple occasions that San Antonio was exactly where he wanted to be.
He had good reason, given San Antonio’s track record for prioritizing international scouting, its three-decade run of developing stars from all over the world, including France, and the five NBA titles and 22 straight postseason berths dotting a multiple-era dynasty that remains unrivaled in modern NBA history.
So, when the time came for the Spurs to make their selection in the 2023 NBA draft, dreams became reality.
“The greatest thing I could have asked for,” Wembanyama said. “The greatest franchise, the greatest team, the greatest culture, the greatest fans.”
Parker, for his part, experienced somewhat of a different dynamic: selected by the Spurs with the 28th pick in 2001, at a time when taking a French point guard in the NBA draft was unheard of.
Fellow Frenchman Boris Diaw, who won the 2000 FIBA Under-18 Championship alongside Parker and captured an NBA title with San Antonio in 2014, told a story at Parker’s jersey retirement ceremony with the Spurs in 2019 that encapsulates the atmosphere Wembanyama is experiencing now.
Diaw recalled that while he hadn’t yet become an NBA player, Parker – the then-19-year-old Spurs rookie – invited him to coach Gregg Popovich’s home for Christmas dinner.
Diaw found it odd, he said, that a coach of Popovich’s stature would ask his first-year guard over for a meal on Christmas, and odder still that the rookie could invite his own guests. During that dinner, the story went, somewhere in between the main course and dessert, Parker and Popovich disappeared.
“I go look around the house,” Diaw said. "Then I see Pop doing film with Tony about the game the night before. Pop was yelling at Tony.
“And I’m like, ‘Wow.’ So, in the same night, you could have the family setting, all the loving and care, and at the same time caring about making Tony a better player on Christmas night. That’s when I knew Tony was in good hands and that his career was going to be great.”
More than two decades later, that culture remains – for this next generation.
THE CURRENT NBA landscape features a record-tying 14 French players, including two Spurs in Wembanyama and Sidy Cissoko, the 44th pick of the 2023 draft.
The 2024 draft marked the first time three players from the same country outside of the United States were selected in the top 10 in France’s Zaccharie Risacher, Alexandre Sarr and Tidjane Salaun. Teams picked up a record four French players in the first round and five overall.
“Every time I go to a city, I’m like, ‘Oh man, there’s a French guy,’” said Washington Wizards forward Bilal Coulibaly, the seventh pick in 2023 and Wembanyama’s former teammate on France’s Metropolitans 92. “It’s like we really did something.”
Popovich and the Spurs saw this day coming and the longtime coach expressed as much prior to suffering a mild stroke in November that has kept him away from the team. Over the years, the Spurs’ roster has featured a total of seven Frenchmen, including three (Parker, Diaw and Nando De Colo, who was traded to the Toronto Raptors in February 2014) on the 2013-14 squad that ultimately hoisted San Antonio’s most recent Larry O’Brien Championship Trophy.
Having majored in Soviet studies at the Air Force Academy, Popovich speaks Russian and Serbian, and he played on military basketball teams that took him all over Europe. Popovich saw firsthand the talent his European counterparts possessed.
So, when Popovich entered the NBA in the late 1980s as an assistant coach, he was surprised the league hadn’t fully tapped into the European talent pool. Popovich recalled seeing Hall of Fame coach Don Nelson when he traveled to scout the European championships in Cologne, Germany, thinking he was in precisely the right place to uncover talent.
“There was a prejudice [against European players],” Popovich told ESPN. “A little hesitancy because they wouldn’t play defense, won’t assimilate, they won’t like it here. We’d played against some of these guys, and they were awesome. So, I knew they were out there. They were everywhere.”
Now, some 30 years later, opening-night rosters featured 125 international players from 43 countries.
Brett Brown has been with the Spurs organization for a decade, over two stints, serving as an assistant coach from 2007 to 2013 before returning in 2022. He recalls a dinner years ago that made him realize the extent to which foreign-born players had become mainstays of NBA rosters – and why.
“I’m sitting at a dinner table with Boris Diaw, Tiago Splitter, Patty Mills, Sean Marks, Manu Ginobili and me,” Brown told ESPN. “I look around and there’s Argentina, there’s France, New Zealand, Brazil, there’s Australia. They’re heavyweights on the global basketball scene, stars outside of the country. I think they see the world and the sport just from a much wider lens. They really sort of see things differently.”
IT WASN’T EASY for Parker. There were plenty of instances when, as a rookie, he would stand in the showers after practices – ones in which he had endured some type of verbal lashing – with tears welling in his eyes. He wondered if he would ever be able to satisfy the famously hard-driving Popovich, even though Parker had been named the Spurs’ starting point guard just five games into his first season.
“I make the joke, but it’s true,” Popovich said. “I should’ve been arrested for abuse [for] the things I did to that kid.”
Regardless, Parker found a home over 17 years with the Spurs en route to setting a franchise record for assists (6,829) and earning top-five rankings in games played (1,198), scoring (18,943 points) and steals (1,032).
Parker, a six-time All-Star and member of four All-NBA teams, became the first European to win NBA Finals MVP (2007).
“During training camp and the first couple of games, I was really tough on him, gave him a lot of things to think about, a lot of things to do,” Popovich said. “And he showed he had the fortitude and courage to do this. I gave him the ball and said, ‘This is yours. Figure it out.’”
Parker did just that.
“French basketball is Tony,” Diaw said. “Tony is French basketball. There is no way you can talk about French basketball without the name of Tony coming up.”
It almost didn’t. If Popovich had his way initially, perhaps France wouldn’t currently be the most represented European country in the NBA for each of the past 18 seasons.
Parker’s first workout with the Spurs left Popovich with the impression the Frenchman was “too soft” to excel in San Antonio. Parker took part in a private predraft workout with the Spurs in Chicago against former front office employee Lance Blanks, who dominated from start to finish.
Parker’s dispassionate reaction afterward made matters worse.
Popovich was done and wanted to move on. But Sam Presti, current executive vice president and general manager of the Oklahoma City Thunder, wouldn’t let him. Presti was working for the Spurs in the scouting department under current San Antonio CEO R.C. Buford and had spent extensive time prior to the 2001 draft studying Parker’s game. After Popovich explained why he felt Parker wouldn’t fit in San Antonio, Presti cut up a videotape addressing each of the coach’s concerns.
It convinced Popovich to grant Parker one more workout. The Frenchman excelled.
“R.C. was ahead of his time,” Parker said during his jersey retirement ceremony. “Him and Sam Presti. You took a gamble on me. I was terrible in my first workout with the Spurs. Pop didn’t want to hear about Tony Parker. He was like, ‘I’m done. I want another point guard.’ And R.C., man, you kept talking to Pop, kept showing him the videos. I’m so lucky you gave me a second workout and I was able to show you I wanted to be a Spurs point guard.”
For Wembanyama, the stakes are even higher in leading a franchise beginning its next evolution, fresh off opening a new, $500 million training facility with plans to build a new downtown arena. While Parker started the international movement in San Antonio, the Spurs need Wembanyama to carry it into a new generation – one, once again, of sustained dominance.
TWO DAYS AFTER he was drafted, Wembanyama sat at a dais in San Antonio, the latest international phenom to tantalize the NBA and the latest French prospect to don the black and silver Spurs uniforms.
Next to him stood a 58-inch-tall Lego replica of the Eiffel Tower.
It took a team staffer 15 hours to build the 10,001-piece set, which a Spurs executive purchased the prior winter for $629.99 not knowing the club would wind up drafting Wembanyama No. 1 months later – and unaware of the Frenchman’s love for Lego sets.
The organization admittedly first started fantasizing about drafting Wembanyama four years before it pulled the trigger on the selection.
“It’s amazing,” said Minnesota Timberwolves center Rudy Gobert, a four-time NBA Defensive Player of the Year who grew up in Saint-Quentin, France. “It’s great for all the people that paved the way, the first ones, the first generation like Tony [Parker], Boris [Diaw]. All these guys showed Americans, showed the NBA, they could dominate in this league and be great players in this league coming from Europe. Now, we have kids that are not scared about dreaming about the NBA. All the kids that are courageous enough to dream about that can have role models they can look up to and then try to follow their path.”
While five players from France landed on rosters after the 2024 draft, four more – Nolan Traore, Noa Essengue, Joan Beringer and Noah Penda – should figure prominently in the 2025 draft.
“We love basketball,” the Wizards’ Coulibaly said. “At first it was soccer. Then to see all the greats like TP, Boris Diaw, all these guys getting rings and everything. It was like, ‘Oh man, I want to do this too.’”
Wembanyama said he believes there’s even more room to grow for his country, especially on the international stage. He played on the French squad that fell to Team USA in the gold medal game at the Paris Olympics in August.
“It’s something I’m very proud to be a part of, these waves of players coming,” Wembanyama said. “But I think we’re not there yet. What we lack right now is international titles for French basketball. This is a great adventure. But French basketball is not near its full potential right now.”
Neither is he.
Still, he is confident in San Antonio’s plan to build a winner around him for the long haul.
“I’m confident with the group we have, the people in the organization and the people I’ve been on board [with since] day one,” Wembanyama said. "We know this season it is not going to be a straight line. It’s going to be ups and downs. This is not easy. We’re not going to go 82-0 in a season. We’re going to have losing streaks. But I’m very confident in the will that my guys have.
“The long term is never being questioned.”
By Michael C. Wright | ESPN, via ESPN
