Considered that too but if Ohemaa said the trade was in place “prior to any athlete selections,” wouldn’t that include players drafted 1-7? Sorry just trying to make sense of this & hoping there’s more to come as part of multi-team deal that hasn’t been announced. Should’ve gotten more for the pick.
Based on what the GM said and the article about NBA rules, that would mean they agreed to the trade before the draft but after the 5pm deadline? Otherwise, they would’ve just been able to swap the picks, right?
Player profiles and insights on how life off the court translates into who they are as a player and person. The stuff that there isn’t always room for in the paper.
Naz Hillmon
@richardcohen.bsky.social has the details. 3 years accelerating to $1M in year 3. Love VB and we had to have her but wasn’t expecting the price to be that high.
Glad to hear it.
Similar salary cap hit to the Aces big 3 (though not as talented) so the money can work. The one I’m struggling with is the Liberty’s now big 4. Tell me which one of them is taking less than $1M or I don’t see how you build the rest of the roster.
Didn’t realize Gabby played with Juste in Europe too. Keeps getting better.
One thing W reporters have talked about for the past few years is the smaller PR infrastructure in the league and team front offices and the limited access and transparency. Think that’s also a contributing factor when you talk about investment.
Love that potential backcourt pairing with VB though.
Not a good trend for a program whose historical selling point was elite education and hoops. Kiki showed them how to get the degree in 3 and go somewhere where the basketball prospects are better. Sad to see and not sure how they get out of this cycle.
Sad to see Carla go. Lots of potential. Knew it was either her or Ceci though and I think the Valks made the right choice.
Agreed. I’m hoping the challenges of roster construction might pluck off the Chris Bosch of one of these big 3s once they realize their current team won’t pay the max. From the all-WNBA team, I expect Nneka to be the only mover. But I think Arike and some other former/current all-stars could be had.
Crossing Kelsey Mitchell off as well since she’s likely to get cored.
Tremendous coverage throughout but the article gives the behind the scenes details that really contextualize the player’s emotions. Thanks Jackie
Hey @timkawakami.bsky.social. Marisa’s coverage of the Valkyries last season was second to none. How do we get her on the Valkyries beat for @sfstandard.com this season?
Sorry I’ve been MIA on here and missed this. Still waiting for an update following the new security risk assessment. Not worried about H’s protection for the Invictus year to go celebrations in the UK this summer but it may determine if M joins him.
Happy belated new year to you too.
Also saw you’ve gone freelance. Does that mean no more Valkyries coverage? How do we get the SF Standard to put you on the beat?
Just to clarify, is the agreement that revenue sharing will be calculated on gross revenue exclusively OR the percentage of net revenue they get translates to ~20% of gross? You’re the only person I’ve seen reporting that they’re getting gross revenue which would be great.
Ahhh…thanks for correcting my terminology. Maybe I misunderstood what you meant by business ops when you listed it as a fixed-adjacent cost in your earlier posts. I assumed you meant back office staff.
For shared staff, I was specific to the front office e.g. ticket sales, marketing, etc. not trainers. AFAIK those are team specific & the WNBA sets limits on things like bench coaches.
Re: arenas, economics depends on whether team owns facility & can bank on tkt sales (see Valkyries 22 sellouts).
Fair enough. That explains why so many WNBA teams are getting dedicated practice facilities.
My point is that there are a lot of blended costs and franchise-wide negotiations for contracts that create room for a very liberal expense allocation.
Much of the front office staff is shared. The old Warriors Oakland practice facility was sitting empty AFAIK before it was refurbished for the Valkyries. If you’re telling me that the Washington Wizards facilities were fully utilized by the NBA team in June despite their season ending in April fine.
Only if you calculate those expenses as being solely attributed to the WNBA franchise. But NBA-owned WNBA franchises largely share staff & facilities that would be underutilized or dormant during the NBA offseason. The WNBA charter costs would be negotiated as part of an annual franchise contract.
Also a revenue share that only kicks in after operating costs are covered, as the article states, is not a revenue share. Too little transparency on the expenses side of the books.
Thanks for this. Nneka’s podcast interview with Sue Bird was the 1st time I understood that the 9% of revenue share that has been quoted for the current CBA is really a fixed salary cap with % of revenue calculated after the fact. The question of expense allocation for NBA-owned WNBA teams is huge.
An amazingly candid conversation with former UK Head of Counter Terrorism Neil Basu, who was on the RAVEC committee when the decision was made to remove Prince Harry’s police protection & believes it was done because they didn’t think Harry would leave.
Appreciate your continued coverage. Enjoyed your reporting this season.
“The Golden State Valkyries’ Ohemaa Nyanin (10 ballots) finished in second place”
Not sure why the OP left this out. The Mercury GM came in third.