Wembanyama tops rim deterrence 3.9

Victor Wembanyama is back atop the defensive conversation, and the clearest number this week is not blocks. It is rim deterrence. (sportsinfosolutions.com) Sports Info Solutions published a defensive breakdown on April 21 showing Wembanyama with 51 rim deterrences, the highest figure in its leaderboard. Rudy Gobert was next at 27, followed by Chet Holmgren at 18, Jalen Duren at 15 and Wendell Carter Jr. at 13. (sportsinfosolutions.com) Rim deterrence is a tracking stat for possessions when an attacker gets near the basket and decides not to shoot because the defender is there. It tries to capture the shots a rim protector erases before they ever become a miss or a block. (sportsinfosolutions.com) The same Sports Info Solutions piece showed Wembanyama leading its sample in blocks at 3.1 per game, shots defended at 36.8 per game and opponent field-goal percentage at 41.1%. Those are the visible parts of the profile. (sportsinfosolutions.com) The invisible part is what offenses stop trying. Sports Info Solutions also had Wembanyama at 9.5 advantages prevented per game, ahead of Gobert at 8.4 and Donovan Clingan at 8.1. (sportsinfosolutions.com) That framing lines up with the NBA’s official award result from April 20. Wembanyama was named the 2025-26 Kia Defensive Player of the Year, becoming the youngest winner in league history and the first unanimous one. (nba.com) Other public models point in the same direction, even when they use different labels. CraftedNBA’s player page listed Wembanyama with a 5.1 Crafted Defensive Plus-Minus, a 10.3 block percentage and a 92nd-percentile rim-defense mark. (craftednba.com) CraftedNBA’s rim-protector role table also placed Wembanyama first among that group with a 5.2 Crafted Defensive Plus-Minus, ahead of Gobert at 4.4 and Holmgren at 3.7. The site’s top 20 did not show Jaren Jackson Jr. or Donovan Clingan in the same top tier by that measure. (craftednba.com) Clingan is still part of the broader interior-defense discussion. Basketball-Reference lists the Portland rookie at 12.1 points, 11.6 rebounds and 77 games in 2025-26, and NBA.com’s season preview last fall tied his emergence to a Portland defense that finished top three over the final 41 games of 2024-25. (basketball-reference.com) (nba.com) The viral 3.9 figure circulating on social media appears to flatten a more detailed picture. The stronger documented takeaway this week is that Wembanyama is not just blocking shots at the rim; he is changing whether opponents take them at all. (sportsinfosolutions.com)