Five Out: All-Star Picks, Plantar Fasciitis and a potential Rookie of the Year race for the ages
The weirdness of all-star game voting, more parity in the W and an unlikely MVP this week. Andrew's thoughts on women's hoops for the week of July 8th, 2024.
This week was a good one for the W. The discourse was largely fine, the ball was excellent and it was one of the rare weeks we get in sports where everyone’s agenda’s won.
We’ve got a lot of good stuff coming this week on No Cap Space, so let me give you a little rundown…
In case you missed it, new Liberty signing Jaylyn Sherrod joined the postgame show on Sunday to talk some ball and her new role on the top team in the league.
Iowa forward Hannah Stuelke is this week’s Luxury Tax podcast episode. She talks meeting Maya Moore, who has the AUX in the Hawkeye locker room, her first impressions of transfer Lucy Olsen and watching Caitlin Clark in the WNBA.
This Wednesday, the first installment of The Legendarium drops. We take you back to 1982 to explore the vote that moved women’s basketball from the AIAW to the NCAA, the last champions of that era and Philadelphia’s role as an incubator for the first generation of star players and coaches. On Thursday, a special ‘Rough Cuts’ podcast episode will drop followed by a Legendarium video essay on Friday on Youtube. It’s the first of many in what’s been an extremely fun project. To quote our buddy Chubbs Peterson (RIP Carl Weathers), we’ve only just begun.
Now, onto the column…
1. This was a bad year to not be transparent with All-Star voting.
Here’s a wild stat to open things up: WNBA All-Star voting was up SIX HUNDRED PERCENT year over year. Not six percent, not sixety percent. Six hundred. Who you decide to attribute that growth to is totally up to you but the numbers don’t lie. The rookies have brought an interest in the game unlike anything we’ve ever seen before. Here’s where it gets interesting though…
The entirety of the 2024 Team USA Olympic roster were named All-Stars. Any top 10 vote getter (weighted as 50% fan vote, 25% media vote, 25% player vote) not going to Paris would be automatically placed on Team WNBA. For reference, Aliyah Boston and Caitlin Clark were selected after the first voting rounds. The next 36 highest vote getters were then turned over to WNBA coaches to fill out the roster.
DeWanna Bonner, Allisha Gray, Brionna Jones, Jonquel Jones, Nneka Ogwumike, Angel Reese, Kayla McBride and Kelsey Mitchell in.
Ezi Magbegor, Chennedy Carter, DiJonai Carrington, Ariel Atkins, Alanna Smith out.
There’s a couple things to point out.
For starters, this years’ voting really laid bare how much a college with a big fanbase helps in the WNBA. The top five fan vote getters — Clark, Boston, A’ja Wilson, Breanna Stewart and Reese — all come from programs that have massive followings. The egregious All-Star snubs such as Magbegor, Carter and Carrington don’t come from massive fanbases that can carry them.
The other weird one here is Angel Reese. In spite of all the love and praise from media members and other players, the Sky’s centerpiece and WNBA double-double record holder had to get in through coach voting while being 5th overall in fan voting. It’s not unheard of, especially given how strong the frontcourt voting was this year, but I would be curious to see who voted her lower: the media or the players. For reference, Aliyah Boston was named an All-Star starter in 2023, finishing 4th in the fan vote, 7th in the media vote and 6th in the player vote.
Last year, we saw full transparency in the voting and one of the most fascinating rankings was Sabrina Ionescu. 6th among fans, 6th among media, 19th among her peers. It was revealing about how the rest of the league saw her. It would’ve been great to have the same degree of transparency this year just to see some of the discrepancies and where those numbers ended up falling. It would help answer some questions and maybe even show that some people aren’t being as honest in their praise as they are on Twitter.
2. It’s official. There is no runaway title favorite this year.
I will give it to the Connecticut Sun. They have, so far, been beating the Fraud Watch allegations. But with the Liberty tripping up to the Fever this weekend, I’m ready to call it. There is no prohibitive title favorite. Initially, I thought it might be New York given their dominant run through most of June. But this July has shown there are some cracks starting to show beginning with Sabrina Ionescu’s hot and cold shooting and Jonquel Jones’ tendency to disappear sometimes.
After last year’s regular season feeling like a mere appetizer for an eventual Liberty - Aces final, 2024 feels refreshingly chaotic. Everyone in the top five of the league has been beaten by an inferior opponent at least once this year and we’re about to get more top end cannibalization as we head deeper into the summer. Is there anyone you can say with certainty is going to be in the final this year?
A week or two ago, I’d have said we were probably getting a Vegas - New York title bout. A week or two before that, I’d have wondered about the likelihood of a Storm vs. Sun championship series. Maybe a Commissioner’s Cup rematch is in the cards. The parity we’re seeing can only be good for the league because it not only keeps things interesting now, in the doldrums of summer, but it also allows us to continue investing into the Sky, Fever and Mercury as potential spoilers given each of them have a noteworthy scalp. In short, the ball is good. And it’s only going to get better as we build into the Olympics.
3.Odyssey Sims is the MVP of the week.
One of the things new generations of WNBA fans are learning is just how difficult it is to break into the league. With just 144 spots, general managers have tough choices to make and, more often than not, they decide to go with veterans when they are in a roster pinch. It makes plenty of sense. The CBA rules are such that it isn’t really saving an organization all that much money by going with a younger, unproven rookie over a longtime presence in the league. So, we typically see some interesting new names from the college game (cough cough Celeste Taylor) fall behind older players and sometimes out of the league. It feels kind of counterproductive to the growth of the league until someone like Odyssey Sims pops up and you remember that the veteran players were just as elite when they were leaving school.
For those unfamiliar, there is no 40-0 Baylor season in 2012 without Sims. She was arguably the best player in America in 2014, averaging 28.5 points per game while winning the Dawn Staley Award, the Wade Trophy and Lieberman award. Her W career has been uneven, from an All-Rookie nod to falling out of a starting role in Los Angeles before popping back up in Minnesota. In 2019, she was an All-WNBA second teamer but since the pandemic has effectively been a journeywoman player getting signed on hardship waivers.
After 23 games with the Wings last year she was not a part of the training camp roster, signed to another hardship on June 24th and has stepped into her role nicely since then. In 5 games, Sims is averaging 12.8 points per game, 5.4 assists and 2.4 steals on 49 percent shooting. In her debut this year, she dropped 18 points off the bench in one of the biggest upsets of the season as the Wings beat the Lynx 94-88.
She said in that presser that she’s still got something left in the tank and it’s clear she does. Although the Wings aren’t going anywhere with the injuries that have decimated their roster, Sims is one of the stories of the week and an example of why some veteran players are consistently worth taking the flier on. It’s also a great situation for Sims herself, who is back in the Dallas area where she grew up and is playing some of her best basketball in five years.
4. Napheesa Collier’s plantar fascitis is worth worrying over.
Plantar Fascitis is one of the most frustrating injuries in sports. Ask Kobe Bryant, Albert Pujols or Scott Podsednik. I’m sure Cheryl Reeve let out an audible groan when she heard that it was the diagnosis for Napheesa Collier. It’s an injury that she’s dealt with since her college career at UConn, according to ESPN. But the trouble is that plantar fascitis can be something that can take you out for a couple games or knock you out for a couple months. The news that she’ll be out indefinitely doesn’t sound encouraging especially with an Olympic trip on the books later this summer.
It’s particularly frustrating for Collier herself as well as the Lynx, who are one of the darlings of the league this season and Commissioner’s Cup champions. In past columns, questions have been asked about the ceiling of Minnesota’s backcourt tandem of Kayla McBride and Courtney Williams. But the assumption was that Collier’s ability was enough that if they ran into a spot of trouble she could continue being the focal point that could help them win games. Her advanced stats, from total rebound percentage to assist percentage to steal and block percentage, were all career highs on less usage than 2023. Her 87.6 defensive rating is the best in the league as is her defensive win shares.
If anyone in the league deserves the “take my energy” meme, it’s Collier. There are other talented players, chief among them Alanna Smith, that will have to fill the void while she’s out. Cheryl Reeve is also one of the few coaches in the league that I trust to be able to figure out how to keep this team chugging. You just have to hope the injury is more a blip than a lingering problem. We’ve had enough crappy injuries this year. No one wants it to claim an MVP candidate.
5. We have a legit Rookie of the Year race. And after a lot of terrible Clark vs. Reese discourse, we finally have a good debate.
Folks, the rivalry is, at last, here.
Angel Reese and Caitlin Clark spent Friday and Saturday putting on shows for the viewing public. If you are in the camp that Reese is a walkaway rookie of the year candidate, you surely felt placated by a 27 point, 10 rebound performance against the Storm (and an elite rim protector in Ezi Magbegor) in which Reese hit not one but two three pointers. On the other side of the coin are those that believe Clark is the best rookie in the class. Playing the league-leading Liberty at home on Saturday, CC made history as the first newcomer ever to record a triple-double (19 points, 12 rebounds, 13 assists) in the WNBA.
It was a weekend in which both sides were right. And that’s when a rivalry is at its’ best. Everything up to this point has been, at best, pro wrestling style promotion to try and hype up a league in need of juice. At worst, it was dehumanizing two young women to score points in a never ending culture war that is tearing at the very fabric of American culture and society. In short, it sucked. But I want to be clear: a rivalry doesn’t have to mean the two sides have to have enmity towards one another. In fact, I’d be willing to bet they kick absolute ass if they get put on the floor together at All-Star.
The ‘rivalry’, if you want to call it that, is two talented players competing against each other for something. And that’s really it all it has to be. Both Reese and Clark have incredible cases for Rookie of the Year and this kind of agonizing choice is why we watch sports. It provides real variance, real consequences and real behavior. Love Island simply isn’t touching this level of drama (though our friends Rob and Leah have tried their damndest).
Let’s just look at the cases for each here and what they stand to achieve.
For Reese: leads the WNBA in…total rebounds, rebounds per game, offensive rebounds, offensive rebound percentage and total rebound percentage. She’s on pace to set a new rookie record for rebounds in a season and holds the double-double streak record (13) for the league. Fastest player since 1999 to record 250 points, 200 rebound and 30 steals.
For Clark: leads the WNBA in…assists and 3 point field goal attempts. Is on pace to set a new rookie record for assists, 3 pointers made per game and can finish in the top three for total points among rookies in league history. First triple-double for a rookie in WNBA history. First rookie to ever record 350 points, 100 rebounds and 150 assists. Fastest player in history to achieve said numbers. Most double-doubles with assists for a rookie in WNBA history (4).
That’s a legit case for both and that means only good things for the league. On top of that, both teams are in the playoff race. This entire last week, we’ve been talking about rookie of the year cases backed by statistics and game play. We’re talking about whether or not these two impact their teams when it comes to winning, how we weigh defensive attention and what records are more impressive. That’s a hell of a lot better than debate shows assessing what a flagrant foul is and whether or not players are jealous of each other. Which is to say that women’s basketball and the WNBA, after a really rough start, is finally entering the tier of mainstream sport. It’s becoming about the ball. All the other stuff is a novelty for awhile but what keeps you in the sports zeitgeist is if you have legit conversations like this Rookie of the Year race. If I’m Cathy Engelbert, this is what I envisioned the season would’ve been from the start. Now the challenge is keeping *this* momentum going. If it does, then sit back and watch the W pass through the stratosphere.