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WNBA Free Agency Frenzy
41 Plays10 months ago
Welcome to a sizzling new episode of "The Spark" – your front-row seat to the scorching hot world of Women's National Basketball Association free agency! In this fiery installment, titled "WNBA Free Agency Frenzy," we're dissecting the game-changing moves and strategic plays that are setting the league ablaze.
Join our hoops aficionados as they analyze the latest signings, electrifying trades, and impactful acquisitions that promise to reshape the WNBA landscape. From buzzer-beating negotiations to slam-dunk transactions, we leave no court unexplored in this thrilling exploration of the free agency frenzy.
Our expert panel breaks down the financial maneuvers, strategic decisions, and the ripple effects these moves will have on teams and players alike. As the WNBA gears up for a season of fierce competition, "The Spark" keeps you ahead of the curve, delivering deep insights and bold predictions.
Don't miss out on the hoopla – hit subscribe, like, and ring the notification bell to stay in the loop on all things WNBA Free Agency Frenzy. Let's ignite the discussion and fuel your passion for women's basketball with "The Spark"! 🏀🔥 #WNBA #FreeAgency #TheSparkPodcast #BasketballFrenzy
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Transcript
Introduction and Holiday Greetings
00:00:00
Speaker
What's going on, y'all? It's DJ TreeCeeTrees, and welcome back to The Spark. I am back to this podcast way before WNBA season starts, and I'm back for a couple reasons. First of all, I hope y'all holiday have been great. The New Year's been wonderful. January is treated you well. Happy Black History Month. Happy Valentine's Day upcoming. Just all in one. And I'm glad to be back to this specific podcast, and I'm gonna tell you why.
Passion for Women's Basketball
00:00:26
Speaker
You know, as I've been finding what I want to talk about in sports and finding my lane and really just engaging with different people online, I think I like engaging with people online about NBA topics. I might make some shorts about that, but a whole dedicated podcast, like I don't really have the passion and the fire for as much, but
00:00:50
Speaker
Y'all know that I have that for the WNBA. I host a show with Michael Matthew called the LA Sparks Weekly Show, but we actually are on court with the Sparks here in LA. So I have a physical commitment to the WNBA. I'm a season ticket holder for the LA Sparks. All these things, I feel this passion for women's basketball. So I think
00:01:12
Speaker
I'm just gonna focus on talking about women's
WNBA's Global Partnerships
00:01:14
Speaker
basketball. I might talk about the NBA here or there, like I said, but the dedicated podcast part for sure, I am going to stick to women's basketball. So there's tons of going on with the upcoming Olympics.
00:01:27
Speaker
with arrow hoops. There's a lot happening with just the WNBA partnering with different people and you able to watch basketball from all across the world. They partner with the, it's the basketball, I think it's just called National Basketball Association, but it's in Australia. So they partner with them and there's international content that's up. So I think they're doing a great job of like unifying women's basketball.
Challenges with NBA Content Creation
00:01:53
Speaker
And I could just do a better job of covering that because
00:01:57
Speaker
Honestly, the NBA has like stressed me out and I'm a Lakers fan. Of course, all LA sports across the board, even USC, come on Juju Watkins. Can you talk about that? Like I've been to a USC game. It wasn't the 51.1 cause that was an away game, but I'm gonna make it a regular habit to try to get out there more because Juju, oh my goodness, like breaking, just breaking records and playing awesome basketball. So anyway, um,
00:02:25
Speaker
Yeah, I don't really like me as basketball that much. I love watching LeBron play. I love in the NBA. I watch every NBA game on league pass as soon as basketball starts in the afternoon. I like engaging with that content, but creating it, not so much, not so much, but
00:02:42
Speaker
Welcome back to
WNBA Free Agency Highlights
00:02:43
Speaker
the show. I have so much to talk about in free agency. If you have been under a rock and haven't been updated on what has been happening, the entire WNBA is playing musical chair, y'all.
00:02:57
Speaker
I mean, let's start with the LA Sparks. All of these updates are on wnba.com. If you go to the top under transactions, you'll see all of what I'm talking about here. But I just wanna talk about some high level things and some teams. Now I'm not gonna go through all of them, but I wanna talk about some that really stood out to me.
00:03:14
Speaker
First of all, of course, let's talk about the Sparks. Lexi Brown just signed a two-year contract. She just talked about it on Gil's Arena that this is her first guaranteed contract, y'all. First guaranteed contract. So congratulations to Lexi Brown on securing a two-year deal with the Sparks on top of this upcoming year. So love that for you, Lexi. Congrats. Leisha is back. Leisha, of course, brings that energy on the court. We love Leisha Clarity.
00:03:41
Speaker
Kia Nurse is new, so excited to see her game and how she gonna ball. She's a forward, I believe. Then we got Ray Burrell is signed. Wow, Ray Burrell is signed, y'all. That's wonderful. Michael Matthew, if he was on this show right now, he'd be saying he is so excited.
00:03:56
Speaker
to see Ray ball. And I'm excited to see her play as well. She can shoot. She's very tall. She's very athletic. She can run the court. Um, and she's aggressive. So love that. And I want to see her play with Z, especially, you know, the two, the two of them at the block, I think would be fun to watch.
00:04:15
Speaker
Um, Eric McDonald from, I think she came from Atlanta. I don't know much about her game, but I think she averaged like 10 points per game last season. Anything helps, uh, can help. And then people play different when they go to different teams. So come on girl, welcome, welcome, welcome. And then, um, the sparks got four draft picks in the upcoming draft. That's in May. So.
00:04:35
Speaker
They got a lot to play with. Two of the draft picks is like, one of them like number two, one is like number four. So it's like, we up there. I think they gonna draft Cameron Brink. I'm not sure. I gotta look at everybody who's in it. I don't think, if you know where they announced that at, let me know, but I don't think they announced it yet.
00:04:53
Speaker
but I just want to check out all the recruits, but we know that LA loves Stanford, in the Stanford program, so we already know what's happening there.
Team Dynamics and Changes
00:05:02
Speaker
All right, let's talk about the Seattle Storm, y'all. This one breaks my heart because Neko Ogumike, who played with the LA Sparks for 12 years, y'all, just decided that in free agency while she was gonna leave the Sparks and go and play for the Seattle Storm.
00:05:20
Speaker
And she announced that like three days after Skylar Diggins has said she was going to go to the Seattle Storm. Mind you, Seattle had a terrible season last year, but Jewel Lloyd had an MVP season. I mean, Jewel Lloyd was really holding down the team. So imagine Jewel Lloyd with Skylar Diggins, who has something to prove.
00:05:39
Speaker
this season, you know what I mean? And Neko, champion, season champion here. You know, it just makes me feel like Vegas is finally gonna have some competition. I'm excited to see them play. I'm not excited that they in the West because it's like, all right, whatever we shake together in LA, we gonna have to compete real hard with them. It was already, you know, I think they beat us with the roster they had last year. And that's like, how does that happen? But they also have an awesome coach in Noel Quinn, so excited to see that.
00:06:08
Speaker
Next, let's talk about the Phoenix Mercury. Also had a terrible season last year. Terrible. I mean, the Sparks beat them three times, I think. It was crazy. But Kalia Copper just left Chicago. You heard me right. Kalia Copper, three-time All-Star WNBA champion and finals MVP, just left there to go play in Phoenix and join Beck Allen from Connecticut Sun. Natasha Cloud, she came from Washington.
00:06:38
Speaker
Brittany Griner was already there and Diana Tarasi is there. In my humble opinion, in my humble opinion, I think Diana Tarasi is going for her final push. And then after this season, she gonna retire because this is a hell of a roster on top of the fact that she already had done the Olympics. So it's like killing two birds, one song kind of thing. So I'm excited to see Phoenix play. They got Sophie Cunningham.
00:07:05
Speaker
Um, who beefed with color copper a little bit. So I'm excited to see them join forces and be on the same team. It's looking good. Let's go to the Connecticut sun. They already had a great roster. Um, the Wanna Bonner, uh, sign there, Tiffany Mitchell sign. And, um, they already had a list of Thomas. So
00:07:23
Speaker
I don't know what's going to happen with Connecticut, but you never know with Alyssa Thomas and DeWine of Honor, because they are the dynamic duo. I don't know what they be doing in the offseason or what kind of training regimen that they have, but they go goat mode every time they get together and get linked up. It's like one will have a 40-point game, and then the other one will come with a 40-point game. They be fighting
LA Sparks' Rebuilding Season
00:07:43
Speaker
to the death. At the end, every game is just wonderful. Anyway,
00:07:48
Speaker
Getting so excited. Moving on to the Atlanta dream. Jordan Canada from the LA Sparks, which I have the Jordan Canada jersey from last year. And I'm glad that I got it. I'm shitty that I didn't get it signed, but you know what? It's all good because when she comes back in town, when we play Atlanta, I'm gonna have her sign her LA jersey. I think she'll do it for me.
00:08:09
Speaker
and I'm gonna try to go into the press conference and get that, or get it before the game. So I'll let you, I'll keep y'all posted on that and see if I get it. Cause then once I get it, I'm just gonna frame it and put it up on the wall. That'd be kind of fire.
00:08:20
Speaker
But so the Atlanta dream, they already had, they had a pretty stacked roster. They, good shooting team, but they just had some inconsistencies and didn't really play well overall to get that playoff push. They now have Jordan, Canada. Ryan Howard was already there. Ariel Powers came from the Minnesota link. So AP is there and Alicia Gray. So it was looking good for the Atlanta dream. I'm sure I'm missing some people there. Like I said, I'm just going high level here. And then with the Minnesota links, Courtney Williams from Chicago.
00:08:46
Speaker
You've heard Chicago a couple of times here and I'm so sorry to all them people in Chicago. I'm so sorry to all them people in Chicago because I don't know who is still on their team. They're gonna have a bunch of new people. They're gonna have a bunch of people just put together and I don't know what's happening there. So hopefully there are still some free agents left that they can kind of grab some people up or maybe the draft kind of changes things or they sign some people to their training camp and really, really
00:09:13
Speaker
get their body count up, because Chicago is looking like the two best players left. Dana, Dana, I love Dana. So I think Dana is still in Chicago, and hopefully they signed her to a long-term contract. So that opened up some salary cap for her. I keep you posted on that. But the Minnesota Lynx have Courtney Williams, Nafisa Collier, and Natasha Heidemann from the Minnesota Lynx. Natasha Heidemann from the Minnesota, no, no, she's not from the Minnesota, she went to the Minnesota Lynx, she from the Connecticut Sun.
00:09:42
Speaker
Um, I saw that kind of coming cause she was kind of second string already. I don't think she was finding her groove and they, and they play off push. So I'm glad that she went over to Minnesota and maybe she'll click better with Nafisa, but.
00:09:55
Speaker
Oh my goodness, all of this has happened and the tray, this was like one weekend to the tray and it started raining in LA and it rained for four days and it never stopped just because, and that's how, you know, that's metaphorically how I felt on the inside because, oh my God, why, I mean, literally this next season, we're going to have to relearn every roster. Do y'all know that?
00:10:16
Speaker
Are y'all aware that this next season, we are going to have to make sure we know. I mean, I'm gonna be on the court like she plays for, sorry. I'm gonna have to study the Rosses because everybody play musical chairs, but it's exciting to see things shake up because people do not want the Aces to do a three-peat. New York got some extra people on there as well. Nobody that I saw that was like real high level, but New York couldn't get the job done, but now they gonna have to go against Jewel Lloyd and the Skyler Diggins and the NECA.
00:10:49
Speaker
or the Kali and the Beck and the top and the BG. It's even like people got some stack Ross and say, you never know what comes out the draft too. So we might be in a whole different situation with the sparks as well. I think this is going to be a little bit more of a rebuild season, which we're okay with because we understand we still got Ziya cook. We got Z as a Ray who played really well. Um, last season, the Erica Hamby, you know,
00:11:14
Speaker
We got some people, we got some juice. So I'm excited to see how this goes.
Commitment to Women's Basketball Content
00:11:18
Speaker
But thank y'all for tapping in. Like I said, y'all got me locked in. I'm gonna be here more often because I enjoy women's basketball more. I'm gonna make me a sweatshirt that say, I like women with my basketball. Or I like W with my NBA. You think the WNBA will sue me? Don't sue me, WNBA. I'm just trying to make a t-shirt. All right, y'all. I'll tap in with y'all later. Make sure y'all like, share, subscribe, and lock in with this channel for more content like this. See y'all soon.