The Girls Of Summer

If you don't watch the Women's National Basketball Association, you don't know what you’re missing!

In a year where “The Boys of Summer” failed miserably, with the Mets and Yankees falling flat on their faces, the New York Liberty stepped up with such an exciting and inspiring season that I became a rabid fan of both the team and the Women’s Professional Basketball Association.

I’m sorry to say I’ve never paid much attention to women’s basketball. Part of the problem was basketball fatigue since the WNBA season starts near the conclusion of the seemingly endless NBA playoffs. Partly it’s because they compete directly with major league baseball—my favorite sport. But mostly this oversight is on me—a feminist ally who obviously still has some blind spots. I had only caught glimpses of WNBA games over the years, usually by accident when flipping through sports channels looking for baseball. 

But this summer I read about how the Liberty had assembled a “super team,” acquiring two former MVPs in Breanna Stewart and Jonquel Jones, along with one of the league’s greatest point guards in Courtney Vandersloot. One night in late June, suffering through yet another desultory Mets loss, I switched to a Liberty game and was quickly hooked by the style, quality, and intensity of play.

As much as I love the New York Knicks, the unselfish play and mantra of hitting the open man that dominated the glory days of Walt “Clyde” Frazier and his two-time championship teams in 1969 and 1973 seem almost quaint in today’s wide open, video game version of the NBA, where ball hogs, chuckers, lazy defenders, and gratuitous dunks are often the rule rather than the exception.

By contrast, the WNBA is consistently old school, hard-nosed, and fundamentally sound. Rather than selfish one-on-one play so typical in the NBA, the women run lots of pick and rolls and back doors to open lanes to the basket. Players move tirelessly without the ball, while looking to pass first rather than shoot. Team defense is tenacious, hardly anyone showboats, and foul shooting is nearly automatic. Distance is also no object, as sharpshooters swish treys from all over the court. The Liberty’s Sabrina Ionescu put on such an extraordinary degree of marksmanship at the All Star game that she even wowed the NBA’s three-point king, Steph Curry.

I also admired the overt sportsmanship among WNBA players, rushing to help opponents up after knocking them down, while exchanging heartfelt hugs after each game. Perhaps the women are more grateful to be playing professionally and realize they must all work together to make their 25-year-old league a success, keep it growing, and secure the future for the next generation.

But what cemented my loyalty was seeing the Liberty in person at Brooklyn’s Barclays Center, where the games were like one big block party. Besides the highly entertaining play on the court, we were treated to Ellie the Elephant driving the crowd into a frenzy with her twerking, while a senior citizen troupe called the Timeless Torches dazzled us with break dances and cartwheels. Starters were announced next to a giant Lady Liberty torch that was set on fire as the public address announcer urged the crowd to “LIGHT IT UP!”

The stands were packed with ecstatic fans—the majority of them women, including many teens and tweens no doubt imagining themselves out on that court. Liberty games were more than a mere diversion for these youngsters; it was proof that girls could become professional athletes. The scene reminded me of when I saw Misty Copeland—the Jackie Robinson of ballet—make history in 2015 as the first woman of color to star in “Swan Lake.” The Met was filled that day with throngs of little Black ballerinas in tutus and dance slippers, accompanied by their beaming moms and grandmothers, all thrilled to see themselves represented on stage. They mobbed Misty at the stage door after her bravura performance, dreaming of literally following in the footsteps (en pointe!) of the first Black female principal at American Ballet Theater.

At one Liberty game I sat next to a 15-year-old girl wearing an Ionescu jersey (while her dad was on her other side, glued to his phone and paying no attention to the action). Early on, with the Liberty struggling, I drew a death stare from her when I shouted, “C’mon, girls! Get it going!! LET’S GO, GIRLS!!!”  Asking what her problem was, she fumed, “Those are NOT GIRLS! They are full-grown WOMEN!!! They are PROFESSIONAL BASKETBALL PLAYERS!!!” I assured her I was both an ally and fan. “What should I say? Let’s go…Ladies?” I asked. “How about, ‘LET’S GO LIBERTY?!?’” she screamed.

After that exchange, we ended up bonding over basketball minutia, analyzing the Liberty’s defensive schemes, offensive patterns, and playoff prospects. Turns out she was on her high school team and dreamed of playing in the WNBA. After the Liberty won, she gave me a high five and sheepishly apologized. “I figured you were just another one of those clueless middle-aged guys who don’t get it,” she shrugged. To her surprise, I thanked her profusely…for calling me “middle-aged.” (At 65, I took the win!!!)

It helped that the Liberty won most of the time, finishing a remarkable 32-8. Falling short of their first championship by losing to the defending champion Las Vegas Aces in the finals did not diminish one of the most thrilling sports seasons I’ve ever experienced.

I love “The Girls of Summer” and can’t wait ‘til next year!!!

I do worry about the league’s long-term viability, since several franchises, including some championship teams, have folded or moved over the years. Doing some digging, I was astonished at how little WNBA players are paid compared to their male counterparts. Jonquel Jones made the most among the Liberty, at $211,150. League MVP Breanna Stewart only earned $180,000. The entire team’s payroll was $1.44 million! Compare that to the Knicks, where Julius Randle tops the charts at over $29 million annually (yet barely cracked the league’s top-50 salaries), and where the team as a whole earns just north of $180 million!

No wonder most WNBA players go abroad in the offseason to make some extra cash. It’s why Brittney Griner ended up in godforsaken Russia, where she was arrested and imprisoned on a bogus drug charge. It’s why Liberty officials had to schlep to Turkey to woo Breanna Stewart as a free agent. For the greatest female basketball players on Earth to make so little is mind-boggling. (But then again, don’t women always seem to get paid a lot less than men doing the same job?)

Of course, it all comes down to how much money the WNBA can generate. Even though the Liberty kept selling out Barclay’s Center, the seat I secured five rows behind the bench for $80 would likely cost me about $3,000 for a Knicks game at Madison Square Garden. The disparity is even worse for TV. The Liberty-Aces Finals averaged 673,000 viewers, which was the league’s highest viewership in 20 years! Compare that to last season’s NBA Finals, between Denver and Miami, which averaged 11.64 million, with the final game drawing 17.9 million.

There may yet be hope for bigger WNBA ratings and payrolls ahead. There is still a ton of talent available and lots of fan attention being paid at the college level, where players are striving to earn one of the few spots available in the pros. This year’s LSU-Iowa women’s NCAA championship game drew an average of nearly 10 million viewers, peaking at 12.6 million. Of course, that was in March, when football’s Super Bowl is already a distant memory and baseball is just getting underway. The WNBA, shoehorned into the NBA’s offseason, plays most of its games over the summer when many people are vacationing, while its fall playoffs compete with the NFL and college football as well as baseball’s playoffs.

I get the math and the extenuating circumstances holding back the league’s growth and players’ pay. But what I don’t get is why more people aren’t following the WNBA in general and rooting for the New York Liberty in particular. If you’re not watching, you don’t know what you’re missing!

Let’s LIGHT IT UP!!

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