The San Antonio Spurs are suffering through their worst stretch of the season, winning just two of their last nine games and falling further out of the playoff race. A large part of the struggles has been defense-related, with them sliding on the end of the floor after making significant improvements earlier in the season. That is a disappointing development that suggests that their early play was fool's gold.
During their recent loss to the Miami Heat, the Spurs had an especially poor showing. Devin Vassell lost Duncan Robinson several times, resulting in open threes for one of the league's best shooters. Wembanyama was also slow to rotate over and contest several shots, failing to provide his normally dominant shot-blocking.
In his defense—or lack of—he was noticeably fatigued at certain points of that game, possibly contributing to his mediocre rim protection. That underscores the need for a better backup center, with San Antonio having to rely more on Wembanyama with no one capable of playing behind him to eat up minutes.
Some of San Antonio's defensive woes could be blamed on the absence of Jeremy Sochan, who is arguably their second-best defensive player. That is a fair point, with him having missed 20 games thus far, including most of their recent losses. Hopefully, that is the case, or the Spurs will have bigger problems going forward.
The San Antonio Spurs can't afford to have their defense slip
San Antonio was once top-10 in defensive rating and can't afford to see their much-improved defense fall off. Without it, they wouldn't be near .500 and in the mix to make the play-in tournament. Fixing their defensive woes may be as simple as having Sochan healthy for the rest of the season and not overexerting Wembanyama.
After all, he is on pace to win Defensive Player of the Year and be the first player since Dikembe Mutombo back in 1995-96 to block at least 4 shots per game. They can do that by prioritizing finding a backup center who can effectively hold down the fort when he sits.
Without that, Wembanyama will be forced to continue to play more minutes to make up for the lack of another viable center option on the roster.
If Sochan can stay healthy and they can find a way to resolve their issues at backup center before the trade deadline, then the Spurs' defensive issues should mostly resolve themselves. On the other hand, if those problems continue, the team could end up back in the draft lottery.