EPISODE TEN - Assassin Mode

WNBA All-Star Starters, Commissioner’s Cup Recap, and Midseason Overpaid/Underpaid Salary Check

Sylvia and her daughter Madeleine preview a two-week podcast break, address Alyssa Thomas’s confirmation of racist messages and death threats after the Caitlin Clark incident, and note Clark’s statement condemning hateful treatment. They break down the newly announced WNBA All-Star starters and voting process (50% fans, 25% media, 25% players, with limited player ballot participation), discuss potential snubs, and look ahead to coach-selected reserves. Game highlights focus on the Wings’ two road wins, including a comeback over the Sun and a win over the Tempo, plus updates on Caitlin Clark and A’ja Wilson sitting out Fever–Aces. They recap the Commissioner’s Cup (Liberty over Aces) and other notable games, then analyze midseason “overpaid/underpaid” players by position under the new CBA, before covering standings shifts, upcoming matchups, couch picks, and their swish list featuring vacation plans and attending Fever home games.

00:00 Welcome and Agenda

00:24 Addressing Harassment

01:11 All Star Starters

03:47 Snubs and Reserves

06:30 Wings vs Sun Recap

10:31 Wings vs Tempo Recap

15:14 League Notes and Injuries

16:45 Commissioners Cup Highlights

19:15 Overpaid Underpaid Intro

21:13 Forwards Salary Breakdown

24:58 Centers Salary Breakdown

28:37 Guards Salary Breakdown

33:57 Standings Update

35:37 Couch Picks Schedule

38:13 Swish List and Wrap Up

Transcript

0:00

Hello, and welcome to Double Drivel a mother-daughter podcast about the WNBA. I'm Sylvia, and I'm the mom. I'm Madeline. Today we'll be covering All-Star starters, game highlights, including the Commissioner's Cup, an- analysis of who might be overpaid and underpaid in the W this season, and of course wrapping up with couch picks and swish list. Wanted to mention that there will be no episode the next two weeks after this due to us being on vacation, and then also wanted to mention that last week's episode was recorded prior to Alyssa Thomas making her comments confirming that she has received racist messages and death threats after the flagrant foul incident with Caitlin Clark. We had mentioned last week that unfortunately we thought that was probably occurring, which she did confirm. So very upset to hear that. That should absolutely not ever be happening. Caitlin also has made a statement denouncing the hateful treatment of players. She did not specifically use the word racism or homophobia. I think it would've been a stronger statement if she had, but I'm glad that she did at least come out and say something. Okay, moving on to the All-Stars, All-Star starters The starters were announced last week. The voting is weighted with 50% fan vote, 25% media, and 25% players. Although we should note that The W reported that only 80 out of 180 players submitted a ballot, so it's not even half of the players that ended up voting. After we talk through, who got the starter roles, we'll talk about some snubs. But if your favorite is not among the starters, there are still 12 reserves that will be selected by the coaches, and those will be announced this Tuesday, the 7th. So there is still hope. All right, starting out with the guards So Paige was announced a starter. She was fan ranked one, media ranked two, and player ranked one. Another Dallas player in the guards that was also listed as an all-star but not a starter was A'ja. And then other starters for guards was Olivia Miles, Caitlin Clark, and Kelsey Mitchell. And just to clarify, A'ja is not officially an all-star yet. It's possible she'll be listed for the reserves. But yeah, these results are just showing kind of how the voting came out for people that were kind of closer to the top 10-ish or whatever. But on the guard side, the top four in the weighted score across fan, media, and player are starters for the all-star, and then six front court players. I have to say I don't really agree with front court getting more. A lot of players that, play the three position, which is considered front guard- court, are listed as guards, and therefore the WNBA app does not allow you to vote for them as front court. So it seems like guards end up getting a little bit unrepresented, underrepresented compared to how many guards there actually are in the league across total players And then on the front court side, starters will be A'ja Wilson, Breanna Stewart, Jessica Shepard, Aliyah Boston, Gabby Williams, and Natasha Howard. First in the fan vote was Aliyah Boston. She came in fifth in media rank and eighth in player rank. A'ja Wilson was second in fan rank, second in media rank, first in player rank. And then the other top candidate there was Breanna Stewart, who was third in fan rank, first in media rank, and second in player rank. She's having a very good season so far. Anybody jump out to you as a snub from the starter list, Madeline? I would say Considering there's only four like guard spots for starting, I would've said even though both of them are good players, probably I would've said either Caitlin or Kelsey, like one of them didn't really have to be there. I feel like Marina should've been a starter because when did anyone else this season tie the scoring record? Like, no one else has done that. And then also, I know Angel Reese was saying she felt like a bunch of the Atlanta Dream players were snubbed. I don't really feel like that from starting. Like, she's a good player. I don't think she's better than anyone who was named a starter, and I don't think anyone on the Dream is better than the people who were named starters, like besides Angel Reese. I don't think Alicia Gray or like Rhyne Howard are better than any of the other players. Yeah, that's where it gets tricky. Like, who are you going to switch them out for? I mean, the Marina Mabrey, a lot of people have been saying they think she's a snub. I think, you know, statistically there's certainly a case for her being a starter, but I do think some people are reacting based on that 53-point game, which is one game that just happened to happen in close proximity to All-Star voting. I wouldn't be surprised if she ended up being a reserve. And the Dream players all were pretty close to making that starter cutoff, so Angel was, I feel like, I think the only player here who had a consistent ranking across fan, media, and player at number six, which would seem to imply that she would make the cutoff of six front court players. But when you look at the weighted averages of everybody else that made it, they are lower than six. And on the guard side, Rhyne Howard and Alicia Gray are the next two. So I expect that all three of them will probably end up in the reserves for All-Star. I think Kelsey Plum is another surprising one. Oh, yeah. And I suspect probably just because she's injured- Yeah and they know she won't be able to play. And then in terms of people that made it last year, Sonia Citron and Kiki Iriafen were there as rookies. They're kind of within the top 10 ranking, but did not make the starters list. I don't think they were starters- No last year either, so that's not huge. They may be in the reserves. And Jackie Young, although I think that's largely just because she started the season pretty slow, but she's doing better now. All right moving on to game highlights. So Wings are two and O in away games. They beat the Sun 86 to 83 on Thursday at another good comeback, led by Paige and then Jessica at the end with those two free throws. They were behind basically the whole game. But then Paige scored a lot, and she ended up with 25 points, seven rebounds and seven assists. And then like I said, Jessica Shepard had those, two free throws that basically sealed the game because, I would assume if she hadn't gotten those, they would only have been up by one, since Paige did miss one free throw. So then all, Connecticut would've needed to do is probably just pass it to Brittney Griner to get an easy two. So they weren't able to do that. She did have 14 points, six rebounds, and only one assist, which I feel like isn't too usual for her. Allana Smith was back without her mask. So after, a week or so, sitting out for concussion protocol, her nose fully healed, so she's was back without her mask. She did much better than she usually did, but she had 11 points and three rebounds. A'ja only had four points, four rebounds, and five assists. She did get those four points all in the fourth quarter, I think, or maybe late, one of them in the late in the third quarter and the other two in the fourth quarter. But those points that she made were definitely in the important time. So she was definitely a contributor either way. The Sun's high score was Leila. That's how you say her name? Yes. She had 18 points, two rebounds, five assists and three steals. Also notably, Arike hasn't been doing very well recently, I'd say. I think it's just more of her being inconsistent like she usually is, but she only had nine points that game. Also, I wanted to note that Lee was also very important near the end in guarding Brittney Griner. Like they were saying during the game, she really made Brittney Griner think more about whether she was gonna take a shot because before it wasn't even a thought, it was just like easy baskets. So even though Lee isn't too good on defense, I think her height made it a lot harder for Brittney Griner to score, so that was definitely good. It's like she heard you last week saying she was sort of afraid to defend and get a foul, 'cause she did defend her pretty well, and she did get called for a foul. But that was definitely important at the end of this close game. Yeah, so Dallas, was... i'm not sure. But they were outscored by Connecticut in every quarter except the fourth, where they outscored Connecticut 31 to 21, which eventually led to them pulling away with the win. And a lot of that was Paige, right? Yeah. It seems like in these close games, especially against teams they should be beating, that she'll just suddenly be like, "Absolutely not. This is not gonna happen." And she kind of like blacks out and goes into assassin mode, which is pretty fun to watch. Yeah, so I actually do think, like I said, near the end they were pretty good at defending Brittney Griner. I mean, I say this like it's a bad thing, but she was five of 12, which wouldn't be too bad if you were, shooting threes and stuff, but considering she's very tall and she's always in the paint, that isn't the best. They held her to 13 points, which in my opinion is good. Also, I'm not sure if there's a lot of injuries on the Sun, but there's a lot of players that didn't play, so I'm not sure. But the bench, Aaliyah Edwards contributed a lot off the bench. I know they were saying it was, like, just a game of UConn players. Um, it definitely almost sounded like a home game the whole time for how many people were cheering for Paige and AZ. But, Aaliyah Edwards did have 11 points, and then today, when we're recording this on Sunday, the Wings beat the Tempo 89 to 76. All of the starters were in double digits. Still another quiet night for Arike, I would say. She only had 10. Awak had 10, which I think is pretty, high for her, because she's more of a defensive player. She doesn't usually get too many points, but she did knock down, two three. She was two of two from three, so that definitely contributed to her points, and then she got two in the paint. Jessica Shepard had 14 points and 15 rebounds, but she only had three assists, but that is another double double for her. Paige had 22, and AZ had 17. I was a little disappointed she didn't beat her, career high for three-pointers in a game. She had five. I know she kept trying to make it six, but she never got a good shot off. But she also had three steals and one block. I also forgot to mention that Awak had one steal and three blocks, which was her... i'm pretty sure they said that was her season high, I know they were saying she was telling another teammate that she wanted to dunk again, 'cause apparently she had done it in a game against Seattle a couple years ago, 'cause I know she took a break from the WNBA for, like, a year or so. I didn't really know she had done that before, since not many WNBA players do do that. But just wanted to say that. Also, it wasn't everyone off the bench played minutes, but only Lee did not score any points, so it was a very, evenly contributed game, I would say. Everyone on the bench had four points or under, but it was definitely still everyone on the bench sort of contributed, Alana Smith only had two points. She didn't play very much, though. She didn't play very much. I did think she got some fouls a little bit early. All of her points were from free throws, so I'm not sure if it was just Jose's choice to pull her out. I know she got, a little bit more minutes than I think she had against... Let me check. I think she had against Connecticut. Oh, no, she had the same amount of minutes, so she wasn't on a minutes restriction tonight. But she still didn't play that much, probably 'cause she wasn't playing the best. But Alicia Clark had three off the bench. Elena Smith had two. Maddie had two. Lee didn't have any unfortunately. Odyssey had two, Shug had four, and Azziya had three, which was from that one play where she, drove to the basket and got a free throw. I do think they did have a pretty good defensive night against Marina Mabrey. They did really good guarding her three. She was only three of nine from three, so I think they were really good at defending her. I know they were also saying she was getting really frustrated at the end because she couldn't do anything, which I think is a really good thing to see, especially since she does get, like, angry a lot during games. So you know when you can, get under their skin like that, you can sort of also affect their game. So I think they did that pretty, effectively. Also, I did wanna note that, Brittney Sykes and Kiki Rice are out injured for the Tempo, so that's definitely made it easier for the Wings to win against them. I know Brittney Sykes is a big scorer, so I know it's not, like, a good thing to see her out. And Julie Almond, who I think is normally their... I don't know if she had been starting or has Kiki Rice. I think they're both point guards. But either way, they're missing two, probably their two best point guards, so. Yeah, I'm not sure. But anyway, either way, Marina Mabrey was the highest scorer for the Tempo, but she had only 19 points, which I say only because usually she scores higher. Sabally had 14 and Isabelle Harrison had 13. Their other two starters only had three, but Kia Nurse did have 12 off the bench, and she was 3 of 7 from three, so almost all her per- her points were threes. Yeah, Marina did hit a couple of threes fairly early in the game- Yeah, and then she- and you were like, "Oh no, here she goes." Yeah, and then she didn't really do it again. I know she kept trying to take those threes, but she never really got a good shot. So that was definitely a good game and a good win for Dallas. They're playing another two away games, I think, against the Liberty and then the Tempo again, and they're playing in Montreal that time. So they'll have had four away games in a row after those two, I'm pretty sure. I'd love to see, a 4 and 0 away, but I'm not sure if they can beat the Liberty, but I hope they can. Yeah, I saw a stat recently, I don't have it in front of me, but it was something like home teams are, like, not doing that well in games. Like, the percentage of games that the home team is winning across the W this season is, like, less than you would expect. Like less than 50%, I wanna say, but I don't have it in front of me. The Fever did not play at all this week. They are playing, just after we will be recording this on Sunday against the Aces in Las Vegas. So we won't cover that here. Caitlin is sitting out that game with a back injury that she had in that Phoenix game, week before this one that just ended. She did say it is improving, and she is practicing with the team again, so she will hopefully be back soon. A'ja Wilson is also sitting out of that game, so, Hard to say who will win with two of the best players sitting out from both teams. Yeah. Hopefully the Fever, but... what was A'ja's injury, do you know? Is it, like, was it her foot? I don't remember. Yeah, I forget. I don't know off the top of my head either. Okay, so several other notable games. The Commissioner's Cup obviously being probably the most notable this week. The Liberty did beat the Aces 93 to 85. Sabrina had kind of been struggling since her return, but has been doing better lately. She was the high scorer in this game for the Liberty side, with 26 points, five rebounds, and five assists. And then Stewie had 25 points and 11 rebounds, four assists, two steals, two blocks. A really good game for her. Pauline Astier, their rookie from France, had 15 points. Jonquel Jones had nine points and nine rebounds. And then on the Aces side, Jackie Young was their high scorer with 31 points, two rebounds, seven assists, and two steals. A'ja sat out of that game as well. Jackie Young, I think as we mentioned earlier in this episode, had started the season kind of slowly, but seems to really be ramping up to her regular form. And then the rest of the Aces starters were in single digits. Kennedy Carter did have 18 points off the bench. She's only returned pretty recently after an illness. She still looks like she's maybe not 100%, but still managed to score 18 points nonetheless. Another notable game is another Liberty game. They beat the Lynx 99 to 86. It was a huge game from Stewie, who had 36 points, seven rebounds, and two blocks. Sabrina had another, decent game with 17 points. Jonquel Jones had 14 points and 15 rebounds, and Astier had 14 points. For the Lynx side, Kayla McBride had 18 points, Courtney Willy- Williams had 16 points. Olivia Miles only had 14, which I feel like she usually has more, but she also had five rebounds and- Five assists, I think, but- and it was a quieter game from Howard, which I assume might have led to their loss a little bit, with only seven points, six rebounds, and two assists. Okay, and then the Valkyries beat the Dream 88 to 83. This was the fifth Dream loss in a row, so they're on a bit of a skid. For the Valkyries, Veronica Burton had 21 points, Gabby Williams had 19 for their top two scorers. And on the Dream side, Alysha Gra- Gray had 22 points, four rebounds, three assists; Rhyne Howard, 19 points, five rebounds, three assists; and Angel Reese had 17 points, 13 rebounds, and three assists Okay. Moving into our overpaid, underpaid First of all, I want to be clear that all of these women have been vastly underpaid since the beginning of this league for the past thirty years. This new CBA was a huge step forward though, and the women are still paid drastically less than the men, nonetheless. Obviously, understand the league needs to continue to grow for the players' earnings to continue to grow, and the players did get a big victory, in negotiations to ensure that there was a revenue share in the new CBA so that their salaries can be tied to the league growth that they are ultimately driving. It is the skill and the talent and the star power of all these women that people are showing up to see, selling out arenas, buying merchandise, getting them these new huge TV deals because viewership is up. So, I'm very glad to see that they will continue to, have a stake and see rewards from that continued growing revenue. So given the new CBA and the very short free agency period, there was not a lot of time for the market to kind of stabilize around what the going salary was for different types of players. So now that we're nearing the halfway point of the season, I wanted to analyze which of the higher paid players seem to be earning their salary and those that are maybe underperforming and thus, quote, unquote, "might be overpaid." And then also look at some of those that are not amongst the top tier of salaries for their position, but are performing at that level and thus might be underpaid. So we looked at this by the position classification guard, forward, and center. We excluded rookies, as their salaries are determined by rookie scale and not by the market, but I will make some honorable mentions in the underpaid category when we get to them. So in terms of looking at who might potentially be overpaid, we looked at all the players earning over one million dollars. So we'll start with the forwards. There are eleven players making one million dollars or above. Napheesa and Ezi are left out of the analysis since they haven't played yet. Napheesa is the highest paid with a super max of one point four million, and Ezi is the second highest with a one point two five million dollar salary. Alyssa Thomas is the highest paid that has been active so far this season with a one point two million dollar salary. And then several players, including Stewie, Gabby Williams, Bridget Carlton, and Alana Smith, are all making the max salary of one point one nine million. And then Dearica Hamby, Azara Stevens, and Kennedy Burke are each making one million dollars So to kind of set the bar of what is over underperforming and amongst these players, they looked at the average stats across them. So the average is 13.5 points, 5.5 rebounds, three and a half assists, 1.2 steals, and 0.6 blocks. My first reaction to this was that feels kind of low for players making over a million dollars. The highest performer is Stewie with 19 points, eight and a half rebounds, 2.8 assists, 1.4 steals, and 1.3 blocks. I do expect once Nafisa starts playing again and ramps back up to her usual production that she'll be in a similar territory, if not maybe a little bit higher on the point side when she comes back. After Stewie The most notable in kind of the point forward category is Alyssa Thomas with 14.7 points, 6.6 rebounds, 8.4 assists, 1.4 steals, and 0.3 blocks. So most players are above the average, for it. So to think about who might be overpaid, we looked at who was pulling the average down. The most glaring example probably will not surprise you, Madeline, is Elena Smith. She's averaging just three and a half points, 2.9 rebounds, and 1.3 assists. She has been injured with the mask, so now that that's off, hopefully she starts improving. She did have, one good game of her two games this week, so hopefully she starts getting back more into that territory. Azara Stevens is a little bit below the average as well. She's been averaging 10.6 points, 6.3 rebounds, and two and a half assists. Regarding Azara, at the beginning of the season, Courtney Vandersloot on the sky said, Now I think Azara can be a star. You know, like we're going to expect big, heavy scoring from her. Like, we need her to step up into a big role, you know, a superstar role. I mean, she's getting a paycheck, so she better step into that, and I've told her that. So that is what we're expecting." So that was a pretty strong statement from Courtney Vandersloot about saying that Azara Stevens needed to earn her salary. Um, I'm not sure if in her opinion she is earning her salary. She is a little bit on the lower performing side here, so she's possibly one that's in that overpaid category. And then Kennedy Burke at 8.2 points, 3.4 rebounds, and 1.7 assists is also likely currently in that overpaid category. In terms of underpaid, kind of looked through for people making less and averaging more than the average of the highest paid players. And for forwards, the only examples of this are players in their rookie contracts, most notably Rickea Jackson, although she is of course out injured for the rest of the season with a torn ACL now. Awa Pham, the rookie for Seattle who's just nineteen years old, and then Kiki Irafen for the Mystics. Okay, moving on to centers So here we only have eight players making one million or more. A'ja Wilson is the only one at the one point four million dollar super max salary. Jonquel Jones, Shakira Austin, and Brittney Griner are making the max salary of one point one nine. And Aliyah Boston, Jessica Shepard, Brianna Jones, and Temi Fagbenle are making one million. Brianna Jones has not played at all yet, so she is excluded. Temi has only played eight games. We did include her, but obviously she's still out injured, so, she's a little bit of a separate case. So the average for the seven players, which excludes Brianna, is just under fifteen points, eight rebounds, three assists, point eight steal, and one point one block. No surprise that A'ja blows everyone else out of the water. She's been a four-time MVP along, with a very long list of other accolades in the W. She is averaging twenty-five point seven points, nine point four rebounds, two point nine steals, and one point six blocks. The next highest points wise is Aliyah Boston with seventeen points, and she has eight point six rebounds and two point nine assists. And the only other player above the average is Jonquel Jones with fifteen point two points, eight point seven rebounds, and two point six assists. So those three have certainly earned their pay. Jessica Shepard is just below average points with fourteen point three, but she is the best in both rebounds at eleven point five and also assists among centers with five point four, and she also is averaging point seven steals. She's not really a rim protector. She's averaging zero blocks. But I think we can say that she's earning her salary as well, and her getting her first All-Star starting position this season reflects that as well. So we're looking at the other players, as potentially overpi- overpaid, which includes Shakira Austin. She's got thirteen points, nine point two rebounds, and two point nine assists. She's playing a really big role as a vet on the Mystics, so I think they would feel that she's probably earning her keep. Brittney Griner with twelve point two points, five point four rebounds, two point three assists Feels slightly overpaid. Again, you know, the Sun are a struggling team, and a fair amount of them are pretty young, so she's playing that vet role. For someone that's been a vet in the league for as long as Brittney and been what she's been through, I certainly don't begrudge her taking home this max salary once the salaries finally got high, but she is a little bit below the average. And Temi, like I said, has only played eight games. She's really struggled with injuries the last few years and, has only been averaging eighteen minutes in the games that she has played with six point six points, four rebounds and one point eight assists. So overall, she seems the most overpaid, but her injury is certainly a factor there. The most obvious underpaid candidate is Natasha Howard, who's averaging seventeen and a half points, seven point eight rebounds and two point nine assists. Her salary is seven hundred K, so, you know, certainly not a bottom of the barrel salary, but not in that million and over category. And it's kind of hard to call Nneka underpaid given that she's just below a million at nine hundred and fifty K, but she also clears all of those averages for the players making a million in others. And then honorable mention in terms of who else would be in this category, if not on a rookie contract, is Angel Reese should be making more money based on her stats. Okay. Finally, the guards. This was the biggest category in terms of players making over one million dollar with twelve players. Sabrina has only played nine games, but she is included, and none of the other twelve players have missed significant games so far this season. Kelsey Mitchell is the only player with the one point four Super Max. Kahleah Copper and Marina Mabrey are at one point two million. Brittney Sykes, Allisha Gray, Sabrina, Courtney Williams, Arike, Kayla McBride are all making the max salary of one point one nine million. And then Ariel Atkins is at one point O eight five, Rhyne Howard at one point one and Chelsea Gray at one million. So they have the highest average in terms of points for the category is at sixteen point two, three and a half rebounds, three point three assists, one point two steals, and point three blocks for this category. Kelsey is the highest scorer with twenty-one point six points, but she is below average in all other categories with one point five rebounds and two point six assists Marina Mabrey is the second highest scorer at twenty-one point two points, three and a half rebounds and three point six assists. And the other players above twenty points are Kahleah Copper and Brittney Sykes. They both have twenty point one points average per game. Alicia Gray and Rhyne Howard are also above the average points with eighteen point four and eighteen point six respectively. Courtney Williams is slightly below average with fifteen point eight, but above average in assists and rebounds. Chelsea Gray has lower points with twelve point three, but is a really key s- facilitator with seven point four assists. So all of those players above, I would say, are earning their salary. Those that are pulling the average down and could potentially be considered overpaid are Arike. I know, Madeline, you've talked about her inconsistency, so certainly sometimes she scores a lot more than that and sometimes significantly less as well. She also averages three rebounds and two point nine assists. Kayla McBride averages fourteen point six points, three point nine rebounds and two point six assists. Ariel Atkins, eight point three points and two point seven rebounds and two point four assists. And Sabrina is currently only averaging ten point three points, but she is ramping back from injury, and her recent games have been a lot stronger, so she's likely not in that category. So of all the categories, I think The guards overall are the strongest in terms of people earning their salaries. You've got a couple there that you could quibble are maybe a little bit overpaid, like Ariel Atkins, but overall a strong group. In terms of underpaid, I don't think you can really call Kelsey Plum underpaid, but she very famously took her $999,999 salary, so she is under that million mark. Before she went out with injury, she is averaging 23.9 points, 2.2 rebounds, and 6.4 assists. Then Veronica Burton and Skylar Diggins are both making around the 920K mark and having strong seasons. And then but in terms of actually underpaid significantly, Kennedy Carter, Rae Burrell, and Marine Johannes are all a little bit below the average points for the top paid guards category, but they're also earning, only earning the league minimum of $277,500. Kennedy Carter in particular, was extremely underpaid for what she's delivering. We know that's likely because she was out of the league last year and has had some issues sticking in the league that seem to be due to off-court dynamics. But those three are the most obvious on the non-paid. Kennedy is averaging 12 points, but some games are much higher. And then Rae is averaging 11.6 points, and Marine 10.3. Marine was starting while Sabrina was out, so she's played a pretty big role for the Liberty. And once again, rookies are the other clear examples. There's some really excellent guards that are on rookie contracts right now. I think all of these names will come as no surprise. Caitlin Clark with 21.2 points, four rebounds, and 8.2 assists. Paige Bueckers, 19.3 points, 3.9 rebounds, and 6.1 assists. Olivia Miles at 18.6 points, 4.9 rebounds, and 5.6 assists. And Sonia Citron with 18.3 points, 3.8 rebounds, and three and a half assists. So that was a lot of stats. But if you've been curious about how people measure up, versus their salaries under this new CBA, hopefully that gives you a little bit of insight. I also wanna say I'm pretty sure Paige is averaging over 19.3 points now. She might be. I pulled this, like, a week ago, so. Yeah, I think she's averaging... I'm pretty sure they said during today's game, it might have been, like, in the past, like, few games, but I'm pretty sure she's averaging 20.1 now, but I might be wrong, so. Could, could be. Could very well be. So yeah. I should have said that, and I forget the exact date I pulled these, but they're about a week stale at this point. Okay, so moving on to the standings. The Aces are now in first with the tiebreaker over the Lynx since they did beat them. The Valkyries are still holding on to third place. The Liberty, the Wings, and the Fever all move up a spot with the Liberty in fourth, the Wings in fifth, and the Fever in sixth due to the Dream moving down. And then the Mystics hold on to the final spot in eighth they had a very, slow start at the start of the season, but then they ended up beating, good teams. Like, they beat the Lynx twice, I'm pretty sure. So they've definitely gotten better since the beginning of the season. Yeah, so the big news in terms of standings this week is definitely the Dream sliding from third to seventh due to those five losses in a row. Yeah, I have heard, you know, when people say, like, contenders or pretenders or whatever, and some people are trying to say the Dream are pretenders. I mean, I think one losing streak doesn't mean that yet. It's still very early in the season to say they're not contenders, but... I mean, five is a pretty long losing streak- Yeah in the W. I'm not really sure what's going on. They still haven't had Brianna Jones, which I do think will make some difference. A lot of people think that Carl Smesko is not using Angel Reese to her full ability and that, you know, she could definitely be used more. He's very focused on shooting threes and very kind of a guard-focused offense. So whether that's to their detriment right now or what, I don't know. But I'm sure they'll bounce back and start winning some games soon. Okay, so one of the last segments that we always do, couch picks for the next two weeks, which we will be on vacation, so we won't have any new episodes while we are away. We might not have a chance to watch a fair amount of these games, but we'll keep tabs. But there's a Wings away game versus the Liberty on July 7th. Their second game against the Tempo on the 10th, which I said is in, Montreal. Then they're playing the Sky at home on the 12th, and then they are playing the Liberty again on the 16th, so they are having, like, not technically back-to-back, but very close, like- In dates playing the same teams because they're playing... They played the Tempo today, and then they're playing them again on the 10th, They're playing the Liberty on the 7th, and they're playing them again on the 16th. It's not gonna be their first matches against the Liberty. It's going to be their second and then their third because I remember they did play them once, and that was Sabrina's first game back the first time, and she didn't do well. Okay. On the Fever side, they are playing the Aces this evening, starting in about seven minutes, so we need to wrap up recording this episode. They're then playing the Sparks on the 8th, the Mercury on the 9th, the Aces again on the 12th. So they're on a beginning of West Coast road trip with that game the first game against the Aces today, and then they'll play the Valkyries at home on the 15th. And then very excited to share that I will be wrapping up our vacation by going to see two home games in Indianapolis for the Fever, their game versus the Storm on the 17th and versus the Liberty on the 18th. So I'll have a lot more to share about that in our next episode some other notable games are the Liberty versus the Lynx. Last time the Liberty did beat the Lynx, so it'd be interesting to see who wins this match up. Then the Mystics versus Toronto on the 14th. Toronto is just under the Mystics in the standings. They have nine wins and 11 losses now since they just lost to the Wings, the Mystics are only just above them with 10 wins and nine losses. So if Toronto is able to beat them and then win another game, I'm pretty sure they will be above them in the standings. And then the Dream is playing the Temp on the 17th, so it'll be to see if they're able to break their losing streak. All right. Closing out the swish list. I am excited for our vacation that we are starting tomorrow. Heading to Boston and New York. And then, as I just mentioned, very excited to end vacation while you and your sister and dad fly home to San Diego, I will fly to Indianapolis to meet my friend Sarah and go to my first ever home games for the Fever. So excited to experience that. How about you? I guess I'd say going on vacation also. Just Dallas winning. Especially a bunch of these close games. It's so odd they keep like almost losing these bad teams and then they play against the Tempo, who's not that horrible, like they're mediocre I'd say, and they just like destroy them. I don't really understand that dynamic. I mean, the league is funny that way. I think there is so much talent in the league that on any given night, any team could have a dominant performance. Especially all teams have kind of hot and cold nights. And so if you manage to play a better team when they're having a cold night and you happen to have a hot night, you can pull off a win. But it is a little confusing at times. All right. Well, that wraps us up. We'll miss you for the next two weeks, but we will be back soon. Thanks for listening. Bye. Bye