How Victor Wembanyama Could Become a Billionaire by Age 33

Oh good, come on, core, or he held it out there so high. See if you can do this?

Is like when you had the pro players and they hold their basketball caps and they're just toying with the little kids.

Even for longtime observers, there's something unique about what they're witnessing this season in the NBA, sports commentators can barely contain their excitement. Twenty year old Victor wembin Yama has big time potential. The French basketball phenom has quickly made his mark on the NBA, and when you watch his combination of size, skill, and athleticism, it's clear he is

When was the moment you realize you made Did I make it?

Though? I'm not sure.

Today on the show, we'll look at how Wemby could become the NBA's first on court billionaire and what makes him so unique both on and off the court. I'm your host, Sarah Holder, and this is the big take from Bloomberg News. Randall Williams is a sports business reporter here at Bloomberg and he covers a lot of leagues.

NFL, NBA, MLB, WNBA, NWSL and so many other leagues that are popping up, and it's really fun.

Randal is a basketball fan, so he jumped at the chance to interview Victor Wembanyama. Now, one thing lots of people know about when Minyama is how tall he is, But Randall says there's a difference between knowing how tall he is and feeling it when you're standing next to him.

People don't realize what seven four or seven to five looks like until they're standing next.

To it, and you've had the rare chance to stand out.

I'm not six ten, I'm five to ten. So imagine someone much much smaller standing next to Victor Wombinyama, and like the height thing is one thing. The palm of his hand might be longer than my hand itself.

And Randall did not men's words on how much potential he sees in the young Frenchman.

I think he could potentially be the biggest international superstar ever.

Can you describe his game a little?

I would say his game resembles Kevin Durant a little bit. That's who he modeled his game after. He even wore Kevin Durant shoes growing up. On defense, he's like Rudy.

Gobert for non fans, those are arguably the most dominant offensive and defensive players in the league today at their respective positions. If Wemby fulfills that promise, he will be very well compensated. Wemby stands to earn a billion dollars by age thirty three. Let us know, how does the math work?

So he has a fifty five million dollar contract right now, and you know that deal is going to go for I believe four years. When he gets to the third or fourth year, the Spurs are going to offer him whatever that rookie extension is going to be Bloomberg. I think our estimates have three hundred and sixteen million. It could be more than that, it could be less now, but it's going to be a three hundred million dollar deal.

So what exactly is a supermax deal?

How you become eligible for a supermax is if you win a postseason award, so an NBA MVP, a Most Improved Player, something like that, or you make an All NBA team, and there's three of those. I think that Wemby is very likely to get one one of them, especially as some of these they're not older, but the guys who are dominating the NBA right now they age.

And Wemby is only twenty years old, so he's got years of playing ahead of him.

When you look at that trajectory of his career, the level that he's playing for the Spurs, I would estimate that he's going to be offered a Supermax. That supermax could very well be over five hundred million dollars, which will take him to eight hundred or eight nine hundred million dollars in earnings. The one after that is pretty much the same qualifications. So I think it's very likely that he's going to earn a billion dollars in encore earnings, and god knows what he's going to earn off.

Now. Randall points out that all of this earning is contingent on nothing happening to Wemby, that he a.

Doesn't get in trouble and b doesn't have a catastrophic injury God forbid.

And taller players like him do tend to have a higher rate of injuries. But part of what sets Wemby apart is his unique training regimen that focuses on flexibility.

Based on what I've spoken to him about and even watching him warm up, he is insanely flexible. There was a moment a couple of weeks ago where he sprang like his ankle did something that it was not supposed to do. It was like ninety degrees to the ground and he played.

So a worst case scenario would be an injury. There are also best case scenarios in which Wemby stands to earn that billion even sooner, like if the NBA raises its salary cap and starts paying players more.

And what's happening right now in the NBA is the NBA's media deals is being negotiated. And the last time the NBA's media deal was negotiated, the salary cap jumped thirty percent, which is huge. It really just set up the NBA's players to earn a lot more. Well, this new media deal is going to triple the last one, meaning the salary cap is likely going to jump again. And so anyone who's watched Wemby realizes that this guy

So that's how much Wemby stands to make on the court. To the break, we'll talk about the kind of deals that await him off the court. For a young star like Wemby, there are no shortage of suitors that want him to endorse their products and brands, But so far, Wemby has been very selective in what products he chooses to get behind. For example, while he reportedly had a lucrative offer from Gatorade, Randall says Wemby chose to invest in a smaller, newer sports drink brand he felt was

So Barcode is a plant beaijed drink founded by Mubark malik Is. They call him Bar, and Bar flew to Paris to meet Wemby and his family. And when he gets there, Wemby's mother, who's a nutritionist and a massage therapist, I believe she sits down as she's looking at the ingredients within the Barcode bottle and she's like, oh wow, like, these are some of the things that I gave him as a child. And that was a big turning point.

And Randall's Wemby didn't just do the deal with Barcode because of what the brand represents, but also because they had a unique offering for him. Instead of just a big payday upfront, they gave him an opportunity to invest in the brand, and investing in brands is something Wemby has watched some other huge names in the game do. He told Randall about who he looked up to most.

Kobe, Lebron Jordan, and yeah, Magic Johnson.

These aren't just four of the NBA's greatest basketball talents. Lebron James, Michael Jordan, and Magic Johnson all have networths north of one billion dollars. The late Kobe Bryant's estate is well on its way to eclipsing that number as well, and a lot of their money was made through investments in sports franchises, fast food chains, and entertainment deals. Randall sees Wemby's Barcode investment as a step in that same direction.

So I think that this resembles Kobe Bryant in Body Armorer in some ways. Kobe invested in Body Armor much later in his career, but it netted him four hundred million dollar, and so Wemby could do the exact same thing if Barco continues to grow.

And as for his next move, Wemby says he's just beginning to figure out what his investing game could look like.

I'm just I'm a rookie in the NBA, but I'm also a rookie in the game of investment. So far, we're pretty calm, but someday we're gonna stip in big.

And Wemby isn't just thinking about how to amass a bunch of money, He's also thinking about how he'll spend that money. He sees using his earnings on causes he believes in as another way to express his identity. Here's Randall again.

Another big surprise and an interview which was him saying that he wants to build wells and just provide clean water to third world countries. And one of the things that he was looking at was like mister Beast, who's a YouTuber who was doing some similar things in the continent of Africa. And so I think when he gets more money, when he starts earning a lot more, that's going to be at the top of his to do list.

We'll be watching the season and hopefully for years to come to see whether Wenby joins the ranks of the NBA's all time greats and whether he manages to become a billionaire in the process. Thanks for listening to the Big Take from Bloomberg News. I'm Sarah Holder. This episode was produced by Alex Sugiura. It was edited by Caitlin Kenney. It was mixed by Blake Maples. It was fact checked by Stacy Rene. Our senior producers are Jilda Di Carli