{"id":71208,"date":"2025-08-10T00:37:11","date_gmt":"2025-08-10T00:37:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/71208\/"},"modified":"2025-08-10T00:37:11","modified_gmt":"2025-08-10T00:37:11","slug":"aaliyah-edwards-traded-to-sun-mystics-land-jacy-sheldon-more-at-wnba-deadline","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/71208\/","title":{"rendered":"Aaliyah Edwards Traded to Sun, Mystics Land Jacy Sheldon, More at WNBA Deadline"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Connecticut Sun acquired<\/a> forward Aaliyah Edwards from the Washington Mystics for guard Jacy Sheldon ahead of Thursday’s 3 p.m. ET deadline.<\/p>\n

The Mystics are also getting swap rights for the first-round pick Connecticut got from the New York Liberty. Should Washington exercise that option, the Sun would receive the Minnesota Lynx’s first-rounder.<\/p>\n

For now, that would mean<\/a> the Mystics and Suns exchanging the No. 14 and 15 overall selections.<\/p>\n

Edwards, the No. 6 pick in 2024, has seen her role in Washington’s lineup diminish under first-year head coach Sydney Johnson. She logged 10 combined minutes in the Mystics’ losses to the Atlanta Dream and Chicago Sky.<\/p>\n

Her days were pretty much numbered when general manager Jamila Wideman, who also came aboard in the offseason, used a lottery pick on Kiki Iriafen. With that decision, the organization signaled the former Stanford and USC standout was the new long-term focal point of the frontcourt.<\/p>\n

Edwards, who averaged six points and 3.3 rebounds in 13.3 minutes per contest through 21 appearances, will have a fresh start on another team in a rebuild.<\/p>\n

In Thursday’s announcement<\/a>, Sun general manager Morgan Tuck called Edwards “a transformational talent,” so it sounds like she’ll be featured heavily. Maybe she’ll make the Mystics come to regret their evaluation of her.<\/p>\n

Washington, meanwhile, is looking to Sheldon to help fill the void in the backcourt that was created with Brittney Sykes’ trade<\/a> to the Seattle Storm.<\/p>\n

The team has basically been a guard short all year thanks to first-round pick Georgia Amoore suffering a torn ACL before the opener. Watching Sykes exit exacerbated the problem.<\/p>\n

Sheldon’s shooting is sorely needed in the nation’s capital as well. <\/p>\n

The Mystics rank last in three-pointers made (5.3 per game) and attempted (16.6), and they’re 10th in three-point percentage. In Sheldon, they’re adding a player who’s knocking down 41.2 percent of her long-range jumpers.<\/p>\n

Ultimately, neither Washington nor Connecticut is gaining much more from this trade than the players themselves.<\/p>\n

Because of where they were drafted, Edwards and Sheldon count<\/a> for the exact same figure against the salary cap, and they’re under team control through 2027. The effects of the pick swap project to be negligible as well.<\/p>\n

Thursday’s deal amounted to the Mystics believing Sheldon will be more valuable and a better fit moving forward, with the Sun taking the same mindset with Edwards.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Connecticut Sun acquired forward Aaliyah Edwards from the Washington Mystics for guard Jacy Sheldon ahead of Thursday’s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":71209,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[73],"tags":[99,434],"class_list":["post-71208","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wnba","tag-sports","tag-wnba"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71208","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=71208"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71208\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/71209"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=71208"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=71208"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=71208"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}