New Spurs big man Luke Kornet has a hilarious reason for choosing Tim Duncan’s number

Luke Kornet arrives in San Antonio hoping to become the kind of big man Tim Duncan once was—one of the most feared players in the NBA. And fittingly, the new guy will be wearing Duncan’s old number. Kornet was upfront about the goal behind his jersey choice.

According to what Kornet recently said—reported by Nate Ryan—he decided to wear Duncan’s number with the Spurs in hopes of one day becoming the kind of player Duncan was at the center position, one of the most important roles on the court.

“Spurs big man Luke Kornet cracks that he chose #7 because he wants to be a third of the player Tim Duncan was. Added that he loves multiples & factors,” Ryan wrote following Kornet’s comments.

What exactly is one-third of Tim Duncan’s Spurs career?

For starters, Duncan played 19 seasons in San Antonio. So for Kornet to hit one-third of that, he’d need to play 6.33 years with the franchise. In terms of games, that’s around 463. He’d also need to rack up roughly 5.33 MVP nominations, since Duncan earned 16 during his career—just to name one stat.

But more importantly, to become one-third of Duncan, Kornet would need to stack up some championship hardware. Duncan won five NBA titles, which means Kornet would need at least 1.66 rings—let’s round it up to two, unless we start counting a Finals loss as half a championship.

So what has Kornet done so far?

His eight seasons with the Celtics produced a respectable 5.2 career PPG, while Duncan, in his first eight seasons, was averaging 22.5 points per game—although back then, Duncan was a power forward before eventually transitioning to center, where he averaged 16.3 PPG.

Kornet’s numbers don’t come close, but he does have a championship ring and 43 career playoff games under his belt. That kind of experience could prove useful to a young Spurs squad. He’s played for five different teams, but finally found some stability in Boston.