Among the Lakers’ latest recruits on the free agent market is Wenyen Gabriel. But who is this player very little known to the public of the orange ball? This is above all a real journeyman. We take stock.
With all that is currently happening on the side of the Lakers, something had to be done to generate an electric shock. The easiest way to do this was still to make adjustments to the workforce, and that is precisely what GM Rob pelinka did recently. Indeed, the franchise announced that DeAndre Jordan had been cut, while two new players came to feed the ranks of the Californians.
However, if DJ Augustin is a veteran and a well-known name in the big league, that of Wenyen Gabriel is rather to be placed in the category “unknown to the battalion” for the general public. Never heard of him? Rest assured, it’s not surprising: the Sudanese by birth has not yet shone much in the NBA, with only 58 games played since 2019 (2 points and 2 rebounds on average). All with only one tenure on the clock, which makes it difficult for him to make himself known.
Trained at the University of Kentucky, where he played for two seasons for nearly 6 points, 5 rebounds and one block per game, the strong winger was not drafted when he left the NCAA circuit. Since then, he has mainly accumulated small contracts within the league and has built a CV of a real journeyman. In two and a half years, he is now at no less than six franchises he has gone through! His most productive freelance was in New Orleans, where he played the entire 2020-21 campaign before setting sail again.
If this instability may seem like a negative, meaning that it does not manage to impose itself anywhere, the Angelinos may have also seen it from another angle: by dint of traveling, we learn to integrate quickly to a new environment. Given the struggles of the Pourpres et Ors at the moment, it is better to have players who can contribute immediately. With great athletic potential, the boy should play the role of enforcer in Frank Vogel’s squad.
Wenyen Gabriel, the new Stanley Johnson of the Lakers?
Clearly, therefore, we should not expect him to revolutionize the franchise, and we can rather assume that he will have the role of the napkin agitator at the end of the bench. Nonetheless, LA have shown with Stanley Johnson that those kinds of signings come in handy this year, having a low wage margin. It is now up to the young man to seize the opportunity, and reproduce what he has been able to show in the past:
Not sure that Wenyen Gabriel is the X factor that the Lakers needed to rebound, but they will hardly spit on new blood. We especially hope for the interior that he will be able to settle permanently with them, for once in his career!
