2026 NBA Draft Needs: San Antonio Spurs

The San Antonio Spurs lost. Their championship dreams were dashed, and they need to repeat all the hardships they went through on last season’s run all over again. Losses like that can break a team or forge a determination that leads to a dynasty. The Spurs and Wembanyama need to decide which path to take. Entering the 2026 Draft, the Spurs are looking to shore up their roster for another voyage to the Finals.

State of the Team:

Contending: Dynasty incoming

Positional Strengths and Weaknesses:

Guards:

The Spurs’ guard corps is De’Aaron Fox, Stephon Castle, and Dylan Harper.

Fox, Castle, and Harper are legitimately the best guard room in the NBA. Fox was disappointing in the Finals, but he was also dealing with a nagging high ankle sprain. He provides veteran steadiness and elite speed at the point guard position. Stephon Castle is maybe the only person in the world who actually defended two-time MVP Shai Gilgeous-Alexander well in the Western Conference Finals. Castles playmaking and defending have taken a step up. He needs to improve his threeball and turnover numbers. Dylan Harper was one of the best players in a Finals series as a 20-year-old rookie. If he can keep his momentum, he will easily win Six Man of the Year next year.

Wings/Forwards:

The Spurs’ wing and forward corps is Devin Vassell, Keldon Johnson, Carter Bryant, and Julian Champagnie.

Devin Vassell’s consistent improvement over the past six seasons has been overshadowed by Wembanyama, Castle, and Harper, but he has steadily become a key wing for the Spurs. He defends, rebounds, scores a cool 12 to 20 points, and doesn’t make mistakes. Keldon Johnson is the longest tenured Spur on the roster and had standout plays on their Finals run. He is entering a contract year and won Six Man of the Year this past season. He may leave to pursue more money, or might stick around to help on another playoff push.

Carter Bryant is the other first-round rookie from the 2025 Draft. He is an athletic perimeter defender with a developing threeball. He will eventually become a key 3-and-D player for the Spurs. Julian Champagnie was a surprising starter for the Spurs. He provides an efficient threeball the rest of the roster lacks and hit clutch shots to close out the OKC series. He will need a contract extension after this coming season, and may be supplanted by Carter Bryant as the starting small forward.

Bigs:

The Spurs’ big corps is Victor Wembanyama and Luke Kornet.

Victor Wembanyama has a chase for the best player in the world at 22 years old. He was the first-ever unanimous Defensive Player of the Year, and beat the previous year’s champions, the OKC Thunder, in a nail-biting seven-game series. If injuries don’t derail his career, Wemby will retire in the conversation for the greatest player of all time. Luke Kornet may not be in the GOAT discussion, but his block in the fourth quarter of game seven against the Thunder will be immortalized. He’s a traditional backup big man, but as seen by his negative box score plus-minus in the finals, he can be exposed.

Draft Needs:

The Spurs don’t have a frontcourt partner for Wembanyama. While they had plenty of scoring, they lacked the same physicality and size the Knicks had in the Finals. They would benefit from adding another forward or big man to help with post scoring. The Spurs also need more spacing so Wembanyama can’t be doubled the second he steps foot in the paint. He can somehow still score efficiently, but he probably won’t mind another physical presence to draw attention and take the punishment.

Prospects Who Fit:

Allen Graves (PF/Forward, Santa Clara)

Allen Graves to the Spurs is one of the most mocked selections. They seem fit for each other, fitting needed strengths and minimized weaknesses like peanut butter and jelly. At 6-foot-8, 225 pounds, with a 7-foot wingspan, Graves is a high-IQ operator on offense and defense. He has two major weaknesses that hurt his ceiling, but he has the spacing, decision-making, and defense to be a key role player on a contending team.

Graves was a sixth man for Santa Clara and averaged 22.6 minutes, 11.8 points, 6.5 rebounds, 1.8 assists, 1.9 steals, 0.9 blocks, 0.7 turnovers, and 3.1 fouls, on 61.3% true shooting. Graves shot well as a catch-and-shooter, hitting 41.3% on 2.6 three-pointers per game. He has one of the highest IQ’s in the class. On defense, he’s a supreme weakside help defender, and anticipates offensive plays like he was there during practice. On offense, he rarely turned the ball over, sets strong screens, and has creative bursts of high-vision passing.

Graves isn’t the perfect prospect. He is not a movement shooter; his threeball was efficient but sluggishly slow, and the majority of his attempts weren’t contested. He averaged 3.1 fouls in 22.6 minutes, and in a full game, he’s close to fouling out. His post-game lacks the finesse of his other skills and needs work. He lacks explosiveness and won’t be an above-the-rim scorer. Luckily, the Spurs have black holes that suck in defenders and will give Graves plenty of open looks. The Spurs have potentially the best rim protector to ever touch the hardwood, making Graves IQ and processing turbo-charged. The Spurs don’t need him to be more than he is, and with him being 20 years old, he could hit another level with how advanced his game already is.

Henri Veesaar (PF/Big, North Carolina)

Looking purely at shooting skills from the front court, Henri Veesaar is the best prospect in the class. At 6-foot-11, 227 pounds, with a 7-foot-2 wingspan, Veesaar would make a great counterpunch to Wembanyama in the Spurs front court. Veesaar is a surprisingly agile athlete at his size, and while he doesn’t flow like a raging river, his elegant stream of constant swirling movement is effective. This past season, he was Caleb Wilson’s co-star at North Carolina and finally put it all together in his senior season at 22 years old.

The Estonian threeball is elite, shooting 42.6% on 3 attempts per game. He combined this with his stretchy dunks to average 17 points, 8.7 rebounds, 2.1 assists, 0.6 steals, and 1.2 blocks, on a stunning 66.4% true shooting. Part of his scoring prowess came from playing next to a top prospect Caleb Wilson, but the Spurs would provide a similar opportunity with Wembanyama, Harper, Fox, and Castles’ scoring. His finishing deserves mention as well. He shot 67.7% on 8 attempts per game inside the arc. It’s an underrated aspect of his game, but he has verticality and finesse on his layups. His athleticism isn’t explosive and destructive like Giannis, but is closer to Wembayama’s ballet dancing elasticity.

Additionally, Veesaar’s biggest concern is his strength on defense. He struggled against heavier, stronger bigs, and was pushed around too often. Moving him to power forward changes the conversation entirely. Veesaar will still need to improve his slow closeout, but suddenly his stretchability, rebounding, and sneaky mobility become major strengths for the Spurs to incorporate to the team. Veesaar isn’t the best prospect in the class, but his fit alongside Wembanyama could add another dimension to the Spurs offense and shatter the NBA.