Deep Dive
Shownotes Transcript
WNBA Nation! What's up, everybody?
Kyle Haywood here. I want to talk about me, want to talk about I, want to talk about number one. With my good friend Logan Jones. Logan, are you excited for our episode today? Dude, yes. I feel like we've been talking about it like on and off for the past eight hours and now we're actually in front of the mics doing it and I am. I'm super pumped for this one. Exactly. As soon as the Aces and Fever game went zeros, we've been like...
Slowly chatting about everything that we want to hit tonight.
Honestly, if we wanted to talk about everything that Logan and I have been talking about, you would have a four hour episode in front of you. But as you can tell, looking at the time of this episode, it's not four hours. It's only two. It's going to be. So only a short drive, unfortunately. That's right. That's right. It's not going to be. It's not going to be across like a crossing your entire state type of drive type of drive episode. But.
But we do have a lot of great things to talk about. First of all, I just want to give a shout out. I actually haven't been on Mike for the last little bit. But a shout out to you, Steve and Jason in our preseason picks episode. There was essentially almost every thought that I had as I was, because all I did was I just sent you guys my, my picks. I didn't give any explanations or anything because I was planning on getting there. My night ended up not being able to make it work. So I could, but,
It was funny because as you would say something or Jason or Steve would say something about, well, I think maybe he's picking it this because of that. You guys were almost a hundred percent spot on. I was like, we've been doing this too long and we're too close to friends that you guys know exactly what I'm thinking. So I thought it was, I thought it was really, really solid. Well, Logan, before we hop directly,
directly into what we're going to be talking about tonight. Do you want to give the quick 30 second rundown of how everybody can get in contact with us? Of course. Uh, you found the podcast. Thank you for being here. We hope you stick with us. If you haven't yet left a five star review, tell us what you think of the show, what you like, what you enjoy about our coverage, what, how, how you feel like we fit into your W NBA media diet. That'd be awesome. Um,
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If you just want to keep going in circles from podcast to website, website to podcast, that would be a great way to do it because it's all connected. So WNBA nation.com, that's where you can find us all. And then you'll find each of our individual Twitter handles. If you follow the podcast and the Twitter account, because we're tweeting it and talking about it all the time. So yeah,
If you are new and new to the WNBA and like in that zone where you're looking for a new team, or if you're one of our longtime listeners who's gotten to know us really well over the years, welcome to the regular season. We finally have multiple hosts on a podcast for the WNBA regular season 2023. Let's go. I'm stoked, dude. Well done. Well done.
Logan, we got a few things that we got to hit tonight. But first, can we talk about the games that we just watched earlier today? Yes. Because there were some doozies. There were some seriously great games that were played. The first game of the day ended up being a really solid one between Dallas and Connecticut.
taking care of business against the wings, but a really solid performance, really, of business.
by, by several Dallas wings players in particular, uh, one saw to Sabali who came away with 26 points and 14 rebounds. What a solid outing that was by Sabali. Um, but not quite enough to handle the likes of the one of Bonner, Alyssa Thomas, Tiffany Hayes, and Brianna Jones, who absolutely, uh, who absolutely, um, just, just took care of business. Connecticut is looking so solid, uh,
They were the team that I had. I think all of us hosts, we had so many question marks. I think they went everywhere from like maybe like third or fourth to like 11th.
I had him at 10. And I'm correcting you because I don't want people to get even more mad at me. But I did have him at 10. And I have apologized, but I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I am sorry. Do I have honor? A season high 22 points at this one. Breonna Jones was Thomas DeFay's. How?
Somehow they're the same old Connecticut Sun who just at various points around the league have been disrespected for like five or six years, even though
They have to have one of the better win totals of the entire league over the past decade. For some reason, they just won't go anywhere. And I'm not rooting against them. And I'm not rooting for them just because I want to apologize for being wrong. I legitimately am excited about a Connecticut Sun team that is 6-1 and looks like they're going to challenge this year. So I'm happy about that.
Absolutely. Kind of a rough game from Arike. Yeah. Tonight went three of 16. Yeah. From the floor, including 0 for 5. Yeah. I was going to say, couldn't get it going from distance. In fact, pretty much everybody else in the starting five did get it going from distance. So I understand why she kept firing away because they were... They did win the second half of this game against Connecticut. And I think they were trying to take chunks of that lead away. So I understand why maybe...
That was the offensive game plan. But yeah, it is. I don't know. I don't have the stats on this, but I think this is the first time all year that Sobby has had more shot attempts than a regain a game. I don't think that's a bad approach.
In the future for the Dallas Wings. I don't think you need to go into the game dictating this is how many shots you're going to take. Because how many times you're going to touch the ball or whatever. That's much too stiff. Obviously, because there's a lot of flow to the game. Sure. But I think if you're pounding it into Howard and Sobley more of the time, that's probably a good thing for your long-term prospects. Yeah, I would agree. I think Sobley is going to have an absolute breakout season. And I think that...
with injuries or different team chemistry things going on. I think that her WNBA career has been somewhat stifled to this point. But if you go back and listen to back when Sabali and Ionescu were being drafted, I think I remember talking to several individuals who were close to at least Pac-12 basketball, mentioning that Sabali could...
could easily be the better prospect, even over Ionescu. She's going to be in the league. Yeah, she's going to be a mainstay of the league for a long time. Also, this is not a name that we bring up a lot on the podcast, but since we're touching on Dallas really quickly, Veronica Burton, last year's first round pick. I think she was number seven overall. So very young. I think she's 22 years old. Team high seven assists in the game.
Yeah. So we talk a lot about the starting five players on virtually every team in the league because we kind of run down who's playing well and who's not. I like seeing that from her. We kind of know what we get from Arike on a given night. We know it's going to be inconsistent, but sometimes she's going to go nuclear and go for 30 plus, and sometimes she's going to fall flat in games like this. Crystal Dangerfield, I think, is a really, really strong pairing with her in the backcourt. And then that X factor is kind of that fifth spot because you know Howard and Sobley are going to do their thing every night.
So the bench is Matty Segrist and Awa Queer and a couple of the players. Diamond and Shields we're not going to see because of a knee injury. But the...
that last spot in the backcourt that needs to kind of glue this unit together, I think is going to be Burton. And it seems like she's playing better and better every game. Yeah, I agree, dude. I actually like what I saw from Dallas. Obviously, Arike and Natasha both fouled out in the game, as did Alyssa Thomas. But overall, as well as Connecticut's been playing, I don't think you can be too upset if you're a Wings fan, but excited that you got away with a win here if you're Connecticut. Yeah.
Let's talk Chicago.
and New York today, who just had a really, really crazy game between these two teams. Chicago actually coming back, getting the win, the four-point win after trailing by as much as, I believe, 19 in the third quarter. Big run by Chicago, who came...
storming back and took the lead and held on to it for a four-point lead in New York. Logan, what do you think? Does this game tell you more about Chicago or more about New York? I feel like it tells me a lot about the league in general. And maybe that's not answering your question, but there's a great quote. I saw James K is the one who tweeted it, but I'm sure it's out there on Twitter in a couple of different places.
But basically, the James Wade quote was, I don't think there's a super team in this league. Yeah.
If you don't show up, you're going to get whooped. Like no matter who you play one through 12. Yeah. So on this show, sometimes I am guilty of taking the perspective of there are upper crust elite teams. There are medium inconsistent, but sometimes good teams. And then there's bottom of the barrel teams. And to me, that gap seems really wide. And both the Chicago New York game and the game we're talking about after this is kind of proof of concept that when you have a super competitive 12 team, uh,
league where it's really hard to even make a roster as a first round pick, the gap really isn't as big as maybe sometimes we make it out to be, especially among like media members here. Like the, the results this year that we're seeing is, is sort of proving like on any given night, this New York super team that we lauded so much in the off season can go and lose to Chicago team, who I think a lot of people thought lost a ton in the off season and might be really bad this year.
So instead, you've got a Chicago Sky team that I believe is 4-3 and a Liberty team that is 4-2, basically having the same season so far. Yeah.
I agree. I think that Chicago was kind of a question mark coming into the season. Everybody expected big things from New York. To be fair, I want to give a shout out. I know that you three hosts at least did mention that you thought it would take a little bit of time for New York to gel. And maybe that's kind of what we're seeing this early season.
um, you know, early season, New York with so many new faces on the roster. And most of these faces having never played together. Um, you know, I think essentially their entire starting five, all were on different teams last season. Um, and so I think it's, there's, there's a lot to be said about that. Uh, you know, but Nigel Lainey and Serena Inescu are pretty much your two who are still around from last year and everybody else is new. So, um,
Some big, big stuff coming from New York, but not enough to hold the sky off. Kalia Copper actually had a phenomenal game. Yeah. Shot nearly 60% from the field and had 27 points to go along with seven rebounds and three assists. Monster game from Copper. And we talked about this in the offseason, that with so much star power kind of leaving Chicago with Vander Sloot and Quigley and Parker off,
all finding somewhere else to play this season, that Copper probably could step up and end up being kind of... She's a superstar. She is. She is the most...
I will say she's undertaught. She's not talked about enough, not by WNBA media specific, like, like let's say us or somebody, these other, like, you know, WNBA primary places, but the vast majority of people who like maybe casually follow the WNBA don't know her. And it's an absolute tragedy because she's phenomenal. Yeah. I, I think there is, um,
So two years ago, Chicago won the championship. Candice Parker... It was the year Candice Parker got there and everyone was freaking out at the beginning of the season because she got hurt and they lost a bunch of games. And then they rallied and they were really good and they won the championship. And Candice Parker herself was like, Kalia Copper is the real deal. And that's about when I started paying attention to like, okay, we know she's young and she's good. But if Candice Parker is saying she's the real deal...
I want to pay more attention. And all last season, I was thinking like, yeah, she's like, she's a superstar. She's just kind of overshadowed sometimes on a team full of more established names that are veterans that, uh,
We kind of knew the offseason where they were all going to depart was coming. So we were all kind of seeing if they were going to put together a championship run. Now they've all gone. I think we did a good job, at least in the offseason, of kind of having this. I think each of us had this. Kalia Copper is not just coming into her own, but showing us like she's been this player all along. But for some reason, I still think she's considered almost like a... No one will say this out loud, but like almost a second tier star in the league because you've got...
Off the top of my head, you've got Trazi, Deladon, Greiner, Parker, Asia, Stewie, and everybody else in New York.
Like, I think those are kind of considered like the heavy hitters, hall of famers, whatever. And like, of course, when it comes to hall of fame and longevity of career and stuff like that, like it's much too soon for, and every one of those, and that's fine. But copper, I think is in that it's yeah, it's starting quality. It's her. I need people to start accepting that. Like she's a perennial all-star. She's not just like, Oh, she's having a really good season. She'll probably be an all-star. Like it's a lock.
for me that you're building a team around her or the rest of her career. I really believe in her. Yeah, she puts up points. And what I love about it is she generally is putting up points in a really efficient manner. She put up 17 attempts, but she's shooting nearly 60% from the field. Now, obviously, you're not going to get that efficiency every game, but she's a pretty solidly efficient player. Like...
You know, most of the time when you can go against a John Quill Jones, Bree Stewart front court and say, fine, I will step back and hit threes until you come out here and guard me and you knock down five of them. That's a pretty good way to break down a defense. So she's she's shooting 40, nearly 41 percent from the floor and 50 percent from three.
Like that's she's, she's having a really solid season and I think she's just getting started. I think Chicago's are going to start finding some rhythm. As you look at some of the other starters for Chicago, a lot of Smith, Elizabeth Williams, Courtney Williams, like all three of those players are solid players, not taking anything away, but on some other teams in the league, they're bench players and,
You know, several of them are bench players and here, all three of them are finding themselves starting. Um, Marina Mabry also really solid player, but like, if you look at like the rest of that Chicago roster, a lot of these players were kind of like, you know, traded away or, uh, you know, kind of released from teams. Like,
And yet here they are with Kalia Copper and they're really they're having a great season so far. I think Chicago could be much better than I was at least giving them credit for. I also love Robin Parks, the 30 year old rookie coming off the bench and giving good minutes. I think she played 20 minutes in this game. This is probably more talk on Chicago than is warranted, but the Liberty were fantastic.
purported to be a powerhouse this year. Chicago played a great second. They were down in the first half. They had a terrible second quarter, came back and won in this one. And it felt like they did it with a strong starting five that, as you mentioned, is kind of playing above the sum of their parts right now. And bench players who were not highly touted, bench players coming into the season, are
I got to believe some of that is because James Wade is just a heck of a coach and I've always just loved him. But a lot of that is also just that this team came into the season with an attitude of like, we see all this stuff about the super teams and we see what you're saying about Vegas, about New York and we're Chicago. We're two years removed from a championship and we believe in James and Kalia and everybody else here and don't screw with us. And I love that. I love that. Um,
We got to move on here because we got some other stuff to talk about. But yeah, solid, solid stuff. I think that Chicago is playing better. And obviously we got some early season, probably some gelling issues coming from New York. I'm not stressing if I'm a New York fan right now.
You got to take some of these games. No panic button. I'm not even considering the panic button right now. Take it. Now, if we're six weeks into the season and you're looking just above 500, then I'm starting to get a little uncomfortable. But losing two of your first six games...
Don't sweat it. You're going to be fine, New York. People who have listened to the podcast for a long time know my magic number for the season is about 12 in terms of how many games it takes to really figure out a team's trajectory. We're basically halfway there with most teams. Not even halfway with some teams because some teams only played four games. So right now, New York is 4-2. The two that they've lost, one of them was really close.
It's the beginning of the season. You just heard me talk about how Chicago had an ugly losing streak two years ago when Candice was out just to come back and win a championship anyway. It's fine. No one is panicking about New York yet, I hope. No, I hope not.
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Indeed.com slash blue wire terms and conditions apply. Need to hire? You need Indeed. All right. Let's talk the Aces fever. This is the game that had you and I literally like at the edge of our seat all afternoon because...
Far and away, there was not a single one of us hosts that had... I'm pretty sure, if I remember correctly, every host had the Aces as their number one seed, correct? And everybody had Indiana as their last, if I'm remembering correctly. Yeah, I think our 1, 2, 3, and 12 was all identical. Was all chalk, right? Yeah. So when Las Vegas...
has been going around and doing what they've been doing all season so far. And, you know, they're, they're beating teams very handily, right? They won their first game by 40, the next game by nine, the next game by 30, the next game by 20, the next game by like, like they're smoking teams, right? They're, they're absolutely like, it's been, it's been really, we're actually going to get into the parody of the close games that we've had, but,
That's not necessarily the case with Las Vegas. They're scoring a ton of points. And for the vast majority of this game, we're trailing the Indiana Fever, who have been...
Right. Who have not looked good for seasons for years. They have been poor for a long time, but have shown spirit. They battled in that Atlanta game to avoid setting the record for the longest losing streak. Had a really good game, which I enjoyed because it showed some fight.
It's hard to interject that, but there has been like glimpses of, oh yeah, like the future of the league is on this team. Like there's so many first and second year players that are so interesting to me. But to your point, still just, we don't expect the win totals to be there this season. Right. Let me, let me add a little perspective here for some, for people who maybe haven't been paying attention as much to Indiana because you just haven't.
Take a look at Indiana scores, though. Look at who their losses. They've got four losses on the season. Two of those are to Connecticut, who we've just mentioned is playing phenomenal basketball. Another loss was against New York, who I mean, just who has like what three MVPs on their roster, something like that. They're very good. And then to Las Vegas, who we all knew was going to be, you know, the top dogs.
What what Indiana can do over the next three games is what is really going to be intriguing to me because they've lost. They've lost four times to teams that they should have lost to.
And they beat Atlanta, a team that is probably a good chance of beating. Atlanta is probably a bottom half of the league, right? Atlanta is a classic example of a good team that's not going to be consistent every night because they are all so young and upcoming and figuring things out. So they got the win against a team that they probably should have, but I don't think anybody was picking them over Connecticut, New York, or Las Vegas. However, their next three games are Chicago, Minnesota, and Phoenix.
All of which are winnable games. And I'm intrigued to see what they can do over these next three games.
So not to get too far out of the weeds here. I hope this result doesn't crush their spirit because I think you're right. I do think that better days are ahead for Indiana. Really quick, just if you didn't get a chance to watch this game, this was close the whole way. This wasn't like the Aces fell asleep at the end of the game or the Fever went way up and then got blown out in the second half. Not really the case. In fact, if anything, it was a very close back and forth game because the second half
The fever actually won the third quarter and it like, like watching the game visually, you're like, yeah, they won that quarter. They were the better team that quarter. Fourth quarter came, came down to the last four minutes. And then the last two minutes, Asia Wilson did her thing. Fever couldn't get the right playoff at the end of the game, ended up losing by four. There's a lot. I'm not a moral victory guy. Obviously, if you're a fever fan, you want to keep your head up and take a lot of good things from this game. Yeah.
To me, I learned something about the Aces tonight as much as I learned something about the Fever. And that's the... They do have an Achilles heel. And it's exactly what we said it was going to be last season. And it's still there this season. And I don't know if any team is going to be able to take advantage of it. But they run a 7-player rotation. And those bench minutes is where Indiana made hay tonight.
So just something to watch if you're looking to try to beat the Aces in a series. The bench was the difference. I thought the Fever were able to dig into 10, 11 players and throw out someone like Queen Eggboat who could score off the bench and Vivians who could score off the bench versus when Clark and Stokes minutes for the Aces, they're just out there.
I'm assuming a directive to never shoot. They're the fifth offensive option. I'm not trying to slander their talents as basketball players, but they are out there to give players breathers. And this Aces team is like a... I don't know. It's like a... I don't know. It's such a well-oiled machine when the starting five are out there because no one can compete with them. But they can't all be out there for 40 minutes. They tried. They tried.
Yeah. Candice Parker, 24. Asia Wilson, 36. Chelsea Gray, 35. Jackie Young, 35. Kelsey Plum, 33. Like, they're not...
I mean, this is going to be their game plan every game this year. And good on the Fever for... I mean, they had to extract genuine playoff caliber effort from the Aces today in order for them to escape with that win. Because anything less and they would not have come out on top in this game. You have to throw a shout out Asia's Way at some point in here because she's unreal. Yeah.
Right. And to the Fever's credit, there's no one in the league that can guard Asia on a night like this. She went 10 of 18. She took two three-pointers. She missed both of them. It doesn't matter. It's not a part of her game. She got to the foul line a bunch.
And that is a problem for every team, but especially a team that needs more team defense like the Fever. They're going to put teams on the line. Vegas shot 22 free throws in this game. That was probably the difference ultimately. But it's because it's just such a tough group to defend. So you have to give Asia her flowers. I don't think...
This is going to be a game that maybe we talk a ton about after this week because by the end of the season, maybe it'll be distant. But it did kind of expose like, this is the Aces strategy. They're going five strong with as little rest as possible every game all year. And this is also a fever team that's got a lot of legitimate scorers on it who are just so young. And they're still just barely figuring it out. And they're already...
Like not the intimidated bottom dwelling fever we're used to over the past couple of years, they are battling and, and I find that encouraging. Yeah, no, I agree. The what's, what's a really telling stat, which I know you and I have varying thoughts on this particular stat, but if you look at the plus minus of these two teams,
Essentially, the Vegas starters all have a good plus. The Vegas bench, very minus. Yeah, extreme minus. It's exactly what you were just saying. Candice Parker, plus 19. Yeah.
Like Stokes and Clark minus 16 minus 14. Like not, not great. You know, like it's, it's, it's really intriguing. What's interesting is that Indiana did this on a night where they weren't relying heavily on number one draft, Bickley of Boston.
She only played about half the game and had seven points. So she didn't do a ton. She was in foul trouble a lot. But they did it with their other pieces, with Wheeler, with Mitchell, with Nelissa Smith, like Queen Eggbow playing good minutes. This was an Indiana team that I think some people are really maybe sleeping on a little bit. I think that this Indiana Fever team...
just have a little bit more to them than I know I've been giving them credit for. So we'll see. We'll see. Any last thoughts on any of these recent games, Logan? My, my, again, one last takeaway from this Indiana game is the aces played well. It wasn't the aces came in sleepwalking and Indiana caught him sleeping. Um,
This was your classic. I mean, they didn't hit threes because Vegas just doesn't hit threes, but it doesn't matter. They get to the line, they shoot a bunch of free throws, but they actually lost the rebounding battle to Indiana. They only had five turnovers. So again, team defense for Indiana. You have to force more turnovers. You can't put people on the line so much. Asia is going to hit all our free throws. But beyond that, this is...
Don't get me wrong. There's still going to be times this year where we watch a fever final score happen that's probably like, ooh, that's ugly. That's still in the cards. There's going to be a couple games that Indiana gets blown out this season. But it's really encouraging that...
I don't know. Maybe that there's a culture change to believe in there after a long time of just feeling like whatever the coach or the GM or the leadership or the roster, whatever's going on there, there's just not a lot of reason to be optimistic.
This is like one little shiny, like, oh, there's kind of reason to be optimistic. I think Melissa Smith is going to be elite scorer in this league. I think everyone agrees Aaliyah Boston is going to be that, you know, that player for a long, long time. I think nobody in the league is anti Erica Wheeler.
And Kelsey Mitchell, who didn't get it done at the end of this game when the team needed her to be the go-to. She still had 22 points in this game. She played really well. It's just sometimes you play against Asia Wilson and it happens to a lot of people. So props to them for this. And I love that this kind of puts an exclamation point on...
an early slate of the season that has been defined by incredibly close games. In fact, historic rates of close games. Yeah. I want to... You've got some stats here, Logan. I do. So I want to dig into this because...
What like this Aces Indiana fever team like game is probably the best segue to that that you could possibly imagine, because Las Vegas as dominant and as unbeatable as everybody, you know, thinks they're going to be or thought they were going to be. I mean, they have been there six and oh, and yeah, like Indiana is what one and four now after this.
But Indiana kind of looked like the better team for the vast majority of this game. So it feels as though there's been so many close games this season, like so many games that have come down to just like the wire right at the end and have been so much fun. And it's not just if you've been thinking that it's not it's not just that, like there it's not just you is what I'm trying to say.
There's actual evidence of this. Logan, do you have your info that you shared early with me? I found this so interesting. So this is courtesy of Across the Timeline on Twitter. They're at WBB Timeline. They're an essential follow.
Even if you're not super into analytics and stats, they just always tell you what the stakes are going into every game every night in terms of who's coming up on big milestones. Go follow them. This is courtesy of their tweet from earlier today. 34 games have been played so far this season. The average margin of victory is basically nine and a half points per game. And remember, that's with some extreme examples of Indiana and Connecticut. Excuse me.
Vegas and Connecticut and some of the teams just like getting some big wins early in season. Nine and a half point average margin of victory. The percent of games decided by five points or fewer, 35%.
Over a third of the games so far this year have been basically two possession games. Including... I don't know if you saw Saturday. Saturday was a day of... There's an overtime game and then 3 other games were 1 point. And it had never been done before. So that was a little bit of an anomaly, but it was very fun. And then I'll give you the last number here. It says percent of games decided by 10 points or fewer, 73.5%. So...
So you're basically like anything beyond 10. I won't call a blowout, but I'll say like it's decided before you get to the final minutes of the game. So for every four women's basketball games you're watching in the WNBA this year, three of them have you on the edge of your seat in the final minutes. That's pretty good.
That's really good. That means there's something to play for in this league every single night, which we knew already. But even if you catch the game halfway through or at halftime or in the final two minutes on league pass, it's been the most... I should have mentioned this. All of those numbers would be league records if the season ended today. That would be... It would blow all the records out of the water. Like...
So what we're saying is when we had a really hard time picking our four through 11 seeds in the preseason, there's a reason for that. And it's not even just those like middle pack seeds.
teams that are doing this. As we saw tonight, there's teams like New York and Las Vegas and Connecticut all playing very close games, even though they're kind of towards the top of the mountain right now. If Dallas and Indiana were going to go toe-to-toe with the Aces and New York, I wouldn't consider those games to always be close, and yet we're seeing that along with a lot of other close games in that kind of middle-of-the-pack group. So
Really intriguing, dude. I think there's going to be some really big surprises in some games this season simply because of the closeness in how this goes down. And I think that the playoff seeding is going to be really, really interesting when that finally comes around.
All right, Logan, one last little topic that I want to that I want to hit with you. And I have to apologize. Maybe you remember this. I can't remember what account it was that put this out as far as like who are who are the top points per game numbers.
leaders were. I think they listed like the top five or six, but it kind of, do you remember the tweet or the account that that came from? I'm blanking right now who we got this idea. I would love to give them credit. I'm seconds away from finding it. Okay. See if you can find it while he's doing that. This last segment that we're going to be covering here, essentially we got this, we got an idea when we saw that, when we saw a tweet that we are going to take the
All of the players who are currently, as of Sunday night, averaging 20 points per game or more, and go around and debate who we think is going to be the WNBA scoring title winner for this season. So there are currently eight of them, and so we'll be discussing each of those eight as we go along.
So the original tweet, I think, actually came from SportsCenter, which is really boring. I don't remember who tweeted it onto our timeline, though. Shout out to SportsCenter. There you go. I want to make sure we get credit. We can give SportsCenter credit. That's fine. We love SportsCenter. I just I thought it was someone that we knew. Yeah. No, it's all good. All right. Here are your top eight in order. All right. Number one in points per game by a ways.
No less. Number one, Jewel Lloyd with 28.8 points per game in only four games played. Number two, Brianna Stewart with 23.7. Number three, Satu Savali, 22.2. Number four, Brittany Greiner, 22.0.
Jackie Young, 21.8. Number six, Arike Ogumbwale with 21.2. Number seven, Asia Wilson at 20.7. And number eight, Nneka Ogumike at 20.3. Logan, just looking at that top eight right now, who do you think is the biggest surprise? I think probably the biggest surprise to me is Jackie Young.
Just because of how loaded Vegas is and you'd expect Kelsey Plum and Asia Wilson to do so much scoring that it really limits your ability to average a good number every night. But there she is at number four, just a bucket behind Arike, who we know is getting tons of volume every night, behind Stewie, who's multiple MVPs. So...
Yeah, I think Jackie Young's probably the one that is maybe the biggest eyebrow raiser. There's another name who we've already brought up in this episode that I'm pleasantly surprised to see up there who I'm assuming you're going to want to talk about. Do you have an answer to that question?
Yeah, well, there's two ways to look at this, right? There's two reasons why you could be surprised. One is just name recognition. Who's a name that you wouldn't expect to be leading the league in scoring? And that's probably Satu Savali because we just haven't necessarily seen that. But I am kind of with you. I think it's really interesting that we have two...
Las Vegas aces players in the top eight that are both averaging over 20 points per game. Like that's really intriguing to me because you've got Candace Parker, who we know can put up points. You've also got Kelsey plum, who we know can put up points and Chelsea gray, who can put up points. And so the fact that we have two aces that are not necessarily the lone focal point of an offense, uh,
In the top eight is really intriguing. And you could say the same thing about Arike and Satu. Like those two being...
you know, you've got two of your top six coming out of Dallas. Also really intriguing, you know, and I'm curious to, it's interesting that they are here on the, and it kind of what that might say about Dallas, you know? So anyway, I, I, I do think it's, it's kind of an interesting consideration to take a look at. But yeah, Logan, kind of the premise of this is I want to talk looking forward to
Which of these players do you think has maybe the best shot at ending the season as the scoring, like, you know, winning, winning the scoring title, basically. So when this original question was posed on Twitter, I said, give me jewel versus the field.
And that's when she and Arike were like neck and neck. And granted, Jules played four games this season. Arike's played like six. It's still super early. But they were both at like 25, 26 points a game. And I was like, I'm taking Jules. And I'm taking her for pretty obvious reasons. I think a lot of people are going to follow my thinking on this, which is she is the go-to offense for the entire Seattle Storm. She's got guaranteed volume. If you're a fantasy football player or fantasy basketball player or whatever, you want the guaranteed opportunities.
Right? She's going to have so many shots a night. In fact, going back to across the timeline, which is really helpful index for this sort of stuff, you can sort it by game average or per 36 minutes. It doesn't really matter what you do. It's obvious that Jewel Lloyd is having a career year in a lot of different ways. She has never attempted more than... She's never attempted 15 shots on average in a game in her career.
She's averaging 23 shots a game this season. That is a significant spike. And she's hitting them at a better rate, by the way. She's hitting threes better than she ever has by a lot. She's never been a 40% three-point shooter before. She's 44 this year so far.
So she's on a tear. It could cool off because maybe a three-point shooting takes a step back or hits a slump for a little while. But the opportunities are going to be there all year long. And for that, I think she's going to end up averaging the most. Because we've seen like Arike is going to go for 40 this season. And Arike is going to have games where she goes for 8.
And like, I, that's going to balance out. I think Julo, it's going to be a little bit like maybe lower ceiling, higher floor, more consistent and end up winning that battle by the end of the year in terms of like points per game. Um,
Yeah. So even now, it's less of maybe a sexy pick now because right now the gap is like, oh, she's averaging five points a game more than everyone else in the league. But I think I'm riding with her. Yeah, the small sample size. Yeah, I'm riding with her. And you got to assume...
Maybe teams learn how to key in on her throughout the season. And maybe that comes down versus these other players on these elite offenses are going to have opportunities to score lots of points because Dallas, Vegas, I think even New York, they're going to have opportunities to put up as a team 100 points in a game. And Seattle's probably not going to have games like that. So it'll be narrower than it looks now, but I'm still taking Juul.
I like it. I think that's... I think it's a good pick. And not, again, like you said, not just because she's in first place by a long ways today. I think there's a couple really interesting things on this list. You know, we haven't really talked hardly at all about Stewie, Griner, or Agumake. Stewie is...
Ridiculous. I don't even know how to explain this right now. She's shooting 52% from the field. Greiner's shooting 68% from the field. These are some really efficient players, right? If you sorted efficiency...
across the board on, on players that are, you know, putting up a certain amount of attempts per game. Um, Stewie, Griner, Soboli, like, like those three might be right at the top of your list as well. Um, so it's not just volume for these three. It's, they're actually being efficient with the ball when they, when they have it. Um, and,
Not only is Stewie just who she is, but the fact that she's doing so with a 31.0 efficiency rating is bonkers to me. It's absolutely crazy what she's doing right now. In fact, let me sort this right now. I just sorted efficiency and...
Wouldn't you know it, here's the top five as far as efficiency rating goes. Brianna Stewart, Brittany Griner, Satu Savali, so the three that we just mentioned, Asia Wilson, Nneka Ogumike. Okay, so all top ten scores. So all top... Yeah, five of the top eight are also in the top... Are the top five of efficiency. So...
And it's just impressive what all five of those players are doing. And so because of that, I tend to maybe lean a little bit that way, just in case there's something if teams start keying in on Jewel Lloyd and say, all right, we got to just we're going to make the rest of the team beat us.
If that's the case, I think one of these other players really could be that. I think another player who's maybe in a slightly lesser type role as Jewel is probably Nneka.
NECA is being very efficient right now. She's averaging 20.3 points per game. She's shooting 56% from the field, and she's getting to the line a lot where she's shooting 96%. So I think NECA really could be someone who I could see slowly creeping up this season.
up this, this leaderboard here, simply because you look at who she's playing with right now and you've got, you know, her sister, you've got Leisha Clarendon, Lexi Brown, Jordan Canada, De'Arca Hamby. Yeah. I think, I think like, I'm like, I'm trying to look at, I'm trying to look at who, who the, who is going to be scoring points for Los Angeles and,
Yeah, it's kind of NECA as your your one a and then you got it's kind of a decent step down as far as as your scoring potential goes. So that I think NECA could could easily be one who goes up the leaderboards a little bit here.
Yeah, that totally makes sense to me. And I, I did want to give a shout out to, uh, there's a couple kind of funny anomalies in when you're looking at stat sheets and stuff like that. Um, all of these players do it in such different ways. Jewel Lloyd, it's like four threes a night. Um, Asia has yet to hit a three. They're both, they're both like tops in the league and scoring. Um,
Some of these players turn the ball over. Some don't. I won't get into that. I love that the two averaging like their top six scores in the league and averaging 10 rebounds a night are Stewie and Satu Sabali. Yeah.
You don't generally... I think people are recognizing her potential, her ceiling, her talent, the need to get her as much offense as you give Arike in that offense in Dallas. I don't think people are ready to have a Satu Sabli MVP conversation yet. But in the first two seconds of the season...
She's basically doing that type of... She's having that type of season. I think she's having a better season than Brittany Greiner so far. Oh, it's close. It's almost identical. It's very, very similar. Like eerily similar. So that's where she's at for context. Yeah, I think... Yeah, Sabali, like... I don't know. Right now, if I'm Dallas, I'm swinging my pendulum...
more and more in Sabali's favor. Again, Arike is a big scorer, but I don't know if her efficiency has ever been really solid. I think that's the one knock. I don't even know if that's her fault. I think she's had to force a lot of stuff in that offense in the past because they're telling her, it's you, it has to be you. And we've seen her be able to do it. We know the type of player that Arike is and that she can be.
But I feel like her efficiency has been really, really poor simply because she's had to be the one scoring. And Dallas has been like, well, that's all we have.
But now I'm starting, if I'm Dallas, I'm going, oh, maybe we had Sabali all along and we should have been getting the ball more to her. Or maybe, I don't know, maybe Sabali wasn't there the last couple of seasons and finally has kind of turned a corner and is going to start putting everybody on notice. And that actually bodes very well for Arike. Because if Sabali's now going to be demanding a lot of defensive attention...
that's going to do nothing but open up things for a Rike. If a Rike can now just play within a system and not force things like she kind of, unfortunately has been made to do throughout her entire WNBA career. This is going to have to be kind of a mental shift for her. If she and Sabali can work and, and play very unselfish basketball, I think Dallas could be a really dangerous season. This could be a really, really fun Dallas team.
Sorry, I got sidetracked. I agree with you and I got sidetracked because I had to do some digging. Do you know... First, do you know how many threes Asia Wilson has attempted this year? Off the top of my head? I think I've only seen her do like a
I don't know, like three, probably. I don't know. Six. Really? This is not... We do not slander Asia Wilson on the show. We love Asia Wilson. I just... I love the contrast between WNBA basketball and the NBA right now, just based on... Asia's one of the... Maybe the face of the league. She's reigning champion. She's won MVPs. And she just couldn't be less interested in
I'm wondering if I'm on the... I wonder if my site is up to date. Oh, I'm on around the CrossFit timeline. I don't know if... You know, I'm on WNBA's website. Oh, okay. Because I just looked at it. As you said that, after you said six, and I looked at it, it says one attempt. So I may... If this is off for everybody, you know what? It probably is because as I'm looking...
Dallas. No, Dallas has played. No, we're good. Dallas played six and Las Vegas played. Yeah. No, I don't know. I don't think it's, I don't think mine's updated on, on a couple of things, but it was, it's different than it was this morning when I was looking at this. Not the first time. WNBA.com has not been a go-to resource. Six attempts. WNBA is saying one, but.
Anyway, that's neither here nor there. I think the rest of these stats are pretty close. None of that probably matters at all. It probably doesn't. But that's crazy. Six in what? Six games? Yeah. One per game. She averaged like one a night. That's crazy. And there's nothing wrong with it. I actually am relieved that this is going to get a little philosophical. I love watching the WNBA because so much of it revolves around both...
Three-point shooting and bigs in the middle and ball movement and cutting to the rim and creating the way that the NBA used to in the early 2000s. I think that's cool. So I have no issue with players just being like, this is what I'm good at. I know what I'm about. There's plenty of three-point shooting in the league outside of Asia Wilson. I'm not worried about it. But I just think it's a funny...
It's just funny because she's so good that you just assume that there's nothing she can't do. And she just does everything she does without ever worrying about stepping outside. Part of that can also be that all of her teammates hit threes. And if she's out there, it means something has gone wrong. You should find...
Yeah. She's probably of the five. She's your number five to take a three. She, she had a bunch last year. Like she finally got it going last year. I don't want to act like it's never happened, but that wasn't a plan. She was allowed to shoot coaching change. Yeah, that's right. That's right.
Awesome. Well, Logan, let's see. Your official pick is Jewel. I probably would say Jewel as well if I were you.
Man, I don't know who else I would put just simply. If you had to say a non-Jewel one, because I'm going to pick that. Let's pick our second option, because I think that's where you and I may differ. Who you got as your second option as far as, let's say, Jewel teams Keyon on her, and all of a sudden she's averaging 10 points. I don't know.
Yeah, or an injury or something like that. Yeah, an injury or something. I don't know. But yeah, I think it would be boring to say Stewie, so I won't. This is tough because it's going to be close anyway. I think I will say Arike. Okay. Because the nights where she is...
nuclear happen, I think more often than not, like, like it's an anomaly when she goes out and only gets three buckets. And even though they're getting Sobby involved, I think that helps her. Like I, maybe, maybe she doesn't take 25 shots a game, but she's still going to get her point totals because maybe she's more open. She's taking better looks. I, I, I just, I trust someone who's done it before and we know she's an elite scorer and
And I do think that the ball... New York is still figuring out how to move the ball around and where it needs to be and how often. And I think things could change in that offense a lot. And maybe they would even be wise to put less on Stewie's shoulders more of the time because she does so much rebounding and other things for that team that maybe you want her more active on defense instead of being your leading scorer every night because you have other players you can score. I don't know. I'm just...
I'm going to go with Rike if I get to pick a number two. Yeah, no, I think that makes a lot of sense. I do think that there's a case to be made for Stewie just simply because of efficiency.
You know, as well as she's scoring. And honestly, not just because of the storyline, Brittany Griner might be it. Because I think we're looking for the same reasons why we've said Jewel Lloyd and we mentioned NECA, right? Like kind of being that one option on your team. Like Las Vegas or not. Sorry, not Las Vegas. But...
Phoenix kind of has, you know, not necessarily every... They don't necessarily have a major scoring... Like a major scoring...
threat outside of Griner. I mean, they do a little bit. Tarazi is Skydig. There's a whole... We could do a whole podcast episode on Skydig and Phoenix right now. But Tarazi is going to put up some points. But right now, Sutton, Suge Sutton, is the third person on this team as far as points per game. Sophie Cunningham, fourth. Mariah Jefferson, fifth. Like...
If Taurasi isn't doing it,
Griner's got to kind of be that 1A for this Phoenix team. So I think that for some of those same reasons that we were mentioning some of these other players, I think Griner's got to get at least a little bit of attention there. Griner and Nneka played the fewest minutes out of all the 8 or 9 teams names that we've been discussing during this segment. And they're still able to score with the top scorers in the league because they're so efficient.
So they're asking, you know, those teams are asking a lot of those players and they're doing it, but they're also taking, you know, the 10 minutes throughout the game to take a breather. Right. Maybe they can find a way to either ask less or keep them on the floor more. And I could, yeah, I could see Greiner, you know, another bucket or two, a game would do it. So, yeah.
I like it. All right. Well, Logan, we have gone long on this episode. So let's go ahead and start to close things out. But thank you, everybody, for listening in and tuning in. We will be having another episode coming your way very shortly here. We've got some fantastic results so far in the WNBA. Lots of parody. If you're like us,
Thank you.
But thanks for listening. Make sure you hit us up with that five-star review. Find us on Twitter or TikTok at WNBA Nation Pod. But for WNBA Nation, I'm Kyle Haywood. I'm Logan Jones. And we got you next time.