Yaxel Lendeborg holds trophy after earning the 2026 NBA Summer League Championship MVP.
Editor’s Note: Read more NBA coverage from The Athletic here. The views on this page do not necessarily reflect the views of the NBA or its teams.
***
As Yaxel Lendeborg boarded the bus to play in his first-ever NBA Summer League game in Las Vegas last month, even he couldn’t quite believe all the steps leading him to that moment. He hadn’t even watched the league’s summer showcase until last season, when he tuned in to watch Dallas Mavericks rookie sensation Cooper Flagg.
A year later, Lendeborg was preparing to take the floor, an “emotional” moment for a young man still trying to comprehend how his life led him to this point.
“When we were going to the game in Vegas, I was about to cry on the bus,” Lendeborg told The Athletic last month. “Like, this is crazy. I’m about to play in the summer league in Vegas in front of a bunch of people … Three or four tears kind of like dripped from the eye, but I was on a bus with a bunch of guys. They don’t even know me. They barely know me, so I can’t just be crying for no reason.”
“This is my first year actually going through having a full year of confidence, I guess you could say,” Lendeborg said. “I’ve never been a confident kid. So, actually having this time to believe in myself — it means a lot to me, and I’m trying my best to not lose that no matter what goes on.”
Lendeborg subscribes to the idea that “pressure isn’t real,” a mindset inspired by a LeBron James’ quote that has helped him navigate an increasingly bright spotlight. The intensity will be picking up soon as Lendeborg enters his first NBA training camp with the Warriors counting on him to pay immediate returns on their draft investment. But in order to understand Lendeborg’s story and where he came from, it’s important to understand the years-long journey it took for him to find himself.
Lendeborg’s journey from a community college in Yuma, Ariz. to UAB and eventual national championship at Michigan has been well-documented. The Athletic wrote about the strong bond Lendeborg has with his mom, Yissel Raposo. But Lendeborg is secure enough in his journey to acknowledge there were times he didn’t think he would ever get to this level.
“It’s happened every year,” he said. “Every single year. Like, more than once every year. [At] UAB I literally had moments where I’m crying in the locker room like, “I quit. I can’t do this no more. I’ve used up all my luck.”
Lendeborg stayed the course, though. Looking back, he says there are three reasons he never quit: his mother, his grandfather and the people who invested in him along the way.
“It’s so much to play for and so much to give up if I actually quit,” he said. “Just having that in the back of my mind definitely kind of helped me out and just the people — just those guys — they really, really helped me out. I really love having people in my circle that are actually willing to spend an extra hour or two talking to me and making sure my mental headspace is right.”
Lendeborg believes the confidence he was searching for finally started to blossom once he reached Michigan. When he started practicing with his new teammates, he was reminded just how talented he was and that he could still stand out while playing alongside five-star recruits.
“I started feeling like, ‘Yeah, maybe I am good enough to play here,’” he said. “That kind of clicked a little bit for me, and then, once it started getting to like I’m getting down on myself because I’m not doing as good as I want. Those guys are like, Man, come on. You’re the No. 1 player in the country … And it’s like, damn, if you guys think that, then why don’t I think that? After that, it just kind of flipped and just became, ‘I am that good. I just got to act like it.’”
Lendeborg said the next breakthrough happened last November when the Wolverines were in the Players Era Tournament in Las Vegas and he put together a strong three-game stretch.
“I’m like, ‘Man, I just did it at the highest level,’” he said. “That’s really where it was like, ‘this is me, I can do this.’ And I started talking a little differently, acting a little differently, confidence was at an all-time high. From that moment on, everything just kept increasing for me.”
Lendeborg’s profile will only increase as his game continues growing. His on-court success and off-court comfort have already made him one of the Warriors’ most intriguing players, and that popularity will only increase if he helps Golden State win.
For his part, the young forward is trying to take his growing fame in stride. He still doesn’t see himself the way the rest of the world does because he’s still coming to grips with the fact that he has become the player he could only dream about when he was younger.
“As far as the expectations and everything that’s going around me, it’s like I’m new to this,” he said. “So, I haven’t been living this role my entire life, this just now became who I am. So, I’m just happy-go lucky about everything. I’m just smiling through it all. Obviously, I have people that don’t like me or don’t like whatever I say, how I play, all of that stuff, so it’s like whatever. Everyone’s going to have their opinion. And for me, it’s just like, pressure isn’t real.”
Every rookie goes through struggles, but Lendeborg’s journey seems to suggest he’s ready for whatever comes next. The little kid who wondered if he would ever reach this level has turned into one of the most promising rookies in the 2026 class.
“Man, I don’t think he’ll believe me if I tell him anything like this,” Lendeborg said of the message he would have for his younger self. “I know he’ll think I’m very cool. Like, very, very cool. We’ll be using yourself in a video game. Looking up to me as a role model, looking up to me as somebody that he doesn’t think can fathom, he won’t even be able to fathom how much we went through and how much we like sacrifice and the fact that it all worked out. I feel like he’ll probably think it will be like a movie script or something like that, you know? But it’s all real.”
