The W.N.B.A.\u2019s twenty-ninth season is in full swing, with the league enjoying its continued upturn in attendance, viewership, merchandise sales, and popularity. The \u201cW\u201d has always had a core base of diehard followers, but they\u2019re now joined by millions of new fans. If you\u2019re among the many tuning in for the first time, here\u2019s everything you need to know about the W.N.B.A.<\/p>\n
When was the W.N.B.A. established?<\/p>\n
Most agree that the W.N.B.A.\u2019s first game was played on June 21, 1997. Others, however, claim that the league did not exist until May 14, 2024, when it sprang forth from the ether, a fully formed metaphysical anomaly, at the precise moment that Caitlin Clark played her first professional game.<\/p>\n
So, which date is correct?<\/p>\n
The school of thought you subscribe to likely depends on whether you prefer to source your information from what is true or from the worst comment thread you have ever read.<\/p>\n
Why is the ball orange and white?<\/p>\n
The orange stripes represent basketball, and the white stripes are a nod to Meg White, another talented, successful, and extremely cool woman who is absolutely unaffected by the fact that you angrily and inexplicably believe that you could do her job better than her, Declan.<\/p>\n
What\u2019s with the team names?<\/p>\n
From the New York Liberty to the Atlanta Dream, one thing is certain: on the day in elementary school when you learn that a noun can be a person, place, thing, or idea, the person responsible for naming W.N.B.A. teams was zoning out and only heard the last one.<\/p>\n
How many of the players are lesbians?<\/p>\n
Yes.<\/p>\n
In what ways has the W.N.B.A. been a trailblazing force for women in sports?<\/p>\n
Lisa Leslie, Tina Thompson, Cynthia Cooper, Sheryl Swoopes, Maya Moore, Caitlin Clark\u2014from the nineties till today, it\u2019s clear that the W.N.B.A. has always been a proud advocate of alliteration.<\/p>\n
I am a man who loves Caitlin Clark. However, much more than that, I am a man who hates women, basketball, and women\u2019s basketball, so it should go without saying that I\u2019m a season-ticket holder who is loudly and violently rooting for the downfall of the W.N.B.A.\/women in general. Is there a place for me in this league\u2019s fan community?<\/p>\n
Bizarrely and unfortunately, yes.<\/p>\n
Speaking of\u2014Angel Reese or Caitlin Clark?<\/p>\n
Nope, next question.<\/p>\n
I love the idea behind the W.N.B.A.\u2019s 2025 \u201cNo Space for Hate\u201d initiative. How can I show that I\u2019m an ally?<\/p>\n
There is no room for discrimination in the W.N.B.A.\u2014after all, some women are just born straight. As an ally, the best thing you can do is remember that, at the end of the day, love is love, and that\u2019s true whether you\u2019re a woman who loves other women, or a woman who loves faux-cursive vinyl stickers that say things like, \u201cMessy hair don\u2019t care!\u201d<\/p>\n
I keep hearing announcers talk about players hitting three-pointers \u201cfrom the logo.\u201d What does this mean?<\/p>\n
A shot \u201cfrom the logo\u201d is an unofficial term for an ultra-long-distance three-pointer\u2014the kind of jaw-dropping twenty-five-to-thirty-five-foot bomb that some players, like the N.B.A.\u2019s Stephen Curry, are known for\u2014taken so far out from the basket that the player is at or near the center-court logo. But the women\u2019s game is a little different than the men\u2019s, so keep in mind that when people talk about, for example, Caitlin Clark\u2019s shooting percentage \u201cfrom the logo,\u201d they obviously don\u2019t mean the center-court logo. They mean any logo, of anything, literally anywhere on earth.<\/p>\n
WOW. YET AGAIN SHOVING THIS ANGEL REESE NARRATIVE DOWN OUR THROATS. THIS LEAGUE LITERALLY WOULDN\u2019T EXIST IF NOT FOR CAITLIN CLARK, AND YET NO ONE IN THE MEDIA EVEN MENTIONS HER. HMM, WHY DO YOU THINK THAT IS?<\/p>\n
I need to say from the bottom of my heart that no one knows why you guys are like this.<\/p>\n
One of my favorite things about men\u2019s basketball is how the announcers seem to have access to an endless stream of the world\u2019s most specific stats. Does the W.N.B.A. do this, too?<\/p>\n
Ummm, is Paige Bueckers the first rookie in W.N.B.A. history to average a Golden Ratio (1.618) when multiplying her scoring-efficiency rating by her assist-to-turnover ratio minus double-doubles in her first seventeen games? (Yes.)<\/p>\n
Is it true that a number of players in the W.N.B.A. find themselves playing alongside, or against, their exes?<\/p>\n
Yes, it is true that in certain cases, these world-class athletes are blocking each other in the paint while they are also blocking each other on social media. And if you don\u2019t think that\u2019s a categorically incredible thing to witness, then the W may not be for you. That\u2019s O.K.! You can still find community elsewhere, like in line at the L.E.D. Strip Lighting for Horrible Bedrooms Store or on the r\/Lawns Subreddit.<\/p>\n
But don\u2019t those complicated relationship dynamics interfere with the players\u2019 ability to focus on the game?<\/p>\n
Anyone who knows basketball at all knows that teams live and die by communication. And, not to put too fine a point on it, but brother\u2014have you met lesbians?<\/p>\n
I genuinely don\u2019t mean this as an insult, but isn\u2019t it just a biological fact that, in terms of pure physicality, there\u2019s a big difference between what players in the N.B.A. and the W.N.B.A. are able to do?<\/p>\n
It\u2019s true that there are physical feats that players in one league can accomplish that players in the other league simply cannot. For example, one league has players like DeWanna Bonner, who can carry and give birth to twins and return the next season to average 17.3 points and 7.2 rebounds a game, while the other league has multiple players like LeBron James, who can carry the ball.<\/p>\n
As a man, I\u2019ve noticed that some of the women in the W.N.B.A. are getting a lot of attention. But the thing is, I want attention, and also, quite frankly, I\u2019m taller.<\/p>\n
Is\u00a0.\u00a0.\u00a0.\u00a0did you have a question?<\/p>\n
Yes. Angel Reese or Caitlin Cla\u2014<\/p>\n
Shut up shut up oh my God shut upppppppp.\u00a0\u2666<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The W.N.B.A.\u2019s twenty-ninth season is in full swing, with the league enjoying its continued upturn in attendance, viewership,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":69804,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[73],"tags":[3103,99,50610,434],"class_list":{"0":"post-69803","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wnba","8":"tag-humor","9":"tag-sports","10":"tag-w-n-b-a","11":"tag-wnba"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69803","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=69803"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69803\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/69804"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=69803"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=69803"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=69803"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}