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Victor Wembanyama tells 60 Minutes he should win MVP this season, and that the Finals ‘showed my limits’
In a 60 Minutes profile, Victor Wembanyama said he should not have been MVP last season but should win it this year, said the Knicks series showed his limits, and explained why he walks barefoot.
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Victor Wembanyama was asked on 60 Minutes whether he should have been MVP last season. He said no. “I should win it this year though,” he added, and laughed.
The 13-minute profile by Jon Wertheim aired on Sunday night, with the Spurs 4-2 and coming off four straight wins. It was filmed this preseason in San Antonio and over the summer in France, and it was less about his size than about how a 22-year-old with no blueprint has decided to look after his body, his mind and his voice.
“No one’s ever played the game like you,” Wertheim told him. “There’s no blueprint here.” Wembanyama agreed. “I think the key is being comfortable not knowing, being comfortable finding out my own answers,” he said. “I am comfortable walking through the fog.”
“It showed my limits”
The fog lifted, he said, in February last season, when the Spurs did not lose a game. They went on to beat Oklahoma City in the Western Conference finals and then lost the Finals to the Knicks in five games, a series in which Wembanyama was cast as the villain after a hit on Jalen Brunson.
He said the label did not reach him during the series. “I’m not paying attention to this during the Finals,” he said. “I don’t think any player on either team really is.” Asked whether it showed a new, edgier side of him, he went the other way. “It showed my limits more than anything else. Going out there, you need to play basketball. You don’t need to beat the s— out of people. If you wanna win, at least.”
Wembanyama on the Finals, posted by 60 Minutes on X.
He also said what he took from Gregg Popovich, who retired in 2025 after a stroke. “After a win you’re rarely as good as you thought you were, and after a loss you’re rarely as bad as you thought you were,” he said, repeating a line Popovich used in film sessions.
Barefoot, size 20
Most of the segment was about his training. After the blood clot in his right shoulder ended his second season in early 2025, Wembanyama said, he became preoccupied with his feet. “Big men have always had feet problems,” he said. “If you got a good foot strength, which brings a good foot posture, everything else can develop the right way. Knee, hip, and back, everything.”
He walks barefoot as much as he can, practices barefoot at times and otherwise wears minimalist shoes. He told a story about a rookie who saw him at practice without shoes and said: “I didn’t know you could just not wear shoes.” Showing off the thick-soled pair he had on, he joked: “This is what I wear for 60 Minutes interviews.”
Wembanyama on his shoes, posted by 60 Minutes on X.
He also talked about the summer of 2025 he spent with Buddhist monks in China, where the first day included an hour and 40 minutes of silent meditation. “I was probably locked in for 30 minutes,” he said. “And then an hour and a half wondering, ‘How much longer is it gonna go on for?’”
He brings a version of it to the free-throw line. “Nothing for a second, and then focusing on making the shot,” he said. “When you try to make it too technical it becomes like a robot.” He put his free-throw percentage at 82% and said it could be better. Through six games this season he is 29-of-39, or 74.4%.
Chess, France and the clot
Wertheim also followed him to Nanterre, outside Paris, where he runs a yearly tournament that mixes basketball and chess. A 9-year-old named Louise beat him in 16 minutes. “She was tough,” he said. “I find that chess is a lot about decision making. And that looks like basketball a lot, at least in theory.”
Wembanyama’s chess game, posted by 60 Minutes on X.
Asked for one good and one bad thing about the United States, he said: “Good is how, like, it feels like you’re never judged for being ambitious. Bad, I would say, I think the social interactions are more shallow here.” He also said he does not live like a regular American. “I live the life of an athlete, of a rich person,” he said. “But it’s the best country to be an athlete in.”
He traced how open he has become to the blood clot. Asked whether there was a moment when he decided not to be guarded anymore, he said yes. “After that it’s like, life is so short, I don’t even wanna waste it being somebody else, you know? Simple as that.”
The MVP case so far
He is averaging 28.0 points, 10.7 rebounds, 3.0 assists and 4.2 blocks in 32.3 minutes through six games, after opening the season 1-of-13 against Oklahoma City. His last three games: 29 against Sacramento, 36 in an overtime win at Utah and 43 points and six blocks against Minnesota on Saturday.
The Spurs host the Utah Jazz on Monday, Nov. 2, at 8:30 p.m. ET (3:30 a.m. Tuesday Cairo time).
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