{"id":876708,"date":"2026-10-09T20:40:15","date_gmt":"2026-10-09T20:40:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/876708\/"},"modified":"2026-10-09T20:40:15","modified_gmt":"2026-10-09T20:40:15","slug":"the-wnba-has-a-fever-the-only-prescription-is-more-valkyries","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/876708\/","title":{"rendered":"The WNBA Has a Fever. The Only Prescription Is More Valkyries."},"content":{"rendered":"

WNBA<\/a>WNBA<\/a>Golden State is building a basketball utopia. Caitlin Clark\u2019s Fever are trapped in a culture war. This offseason could change everything.\"\"Getty Images\/Ringer illustration\"\"<\/a>By Seerat Sohi<\/a>Oct. 9, 1:49 pm UTC \u2022 8 min<\/p>\n

There are times when I am astounded by the scope of the forces the WNBA (and, more specifically, Caitlin Clark) has unleashed. This past week was one of those times, with the Golden State Valkyries\u2014the WNBA\u2019s central queer utopia\u2014taking a 2-0 series lead over the Las Vegas Aces while the Indiana Fever simultaneously underwent a public racial reckoning via the team\u2019s exit interviews.<\/p>\n

This is the whiplash of being a WNBA fan. One of the league\u2019s best stories\u2014an expansion franchise is on the verge of making the WNBA Finals in year two\u2014is occurring concurrently with one of its worst, an ugly reminder of the racism, resentment, and division that have accompanied the league\u2019s explosive growth.\u00a0<\/p>\n

There is, of course, much geographical and ideological distance between Golden State and Indiana. That the league has tried to contain these two competing visions is one of the many ways it reflects American polarization\u2014and why it\u2019s become such a potent vessel for America to argue with itself. I used to wonder whether the WNBA would find itself perpetually trapped in an endless loop of conflict. On Wednesday night, I experienced<\/a> the sensory onslaught of \u201cBallhalla\u201d\u2014what fans call the deafening lavender cauldron of the Chase Center\u2014for myself. The next morning, I watched<\/a> former Fever guard Sydney Colson shed tears while describing the league\u2019s past activism. After witnessing and wrestling with both, I believe a settling force is on its way: free agency and a wealth of new options, on teams with cultures that no longer force players to navigate these contradictions.\u00a0<\/p>\n

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Kelsey Mitchell shoots during Game 2 of the first round of the WNBA playoffs<\/p>\n

Getty Images<\/p>\n

\u201cBalhalla\u2019s been my safe place. That\u2019s what gives me confidence. It gives us all confidence because we get to be our authentic selves here. \u2026 There\u2019s some magic in this building. I swear there is.\u201d \u2014Gabby Williams, after the Valkyries eliminated the Wings in Round 1<\/p>\n

\u201cShowing up every day to compete for fans that may or may not like you is hard. \u2026 I think this organization is unbelievable, man, but I think that when it comes to really trying to be yourself, it hasn\u2019t always been easy.\u201d \u2014Kelsey Mitchell, during her Indiana Fever exit interview<\/p>\n

These quotes were delivered within 24 hours of each other, from the lips of All-Stars in the same league who are going through vastly different lived experiences right now.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Valkyries are the platonic ideal of what some WNBA fans have always thought was possible: an inclusive, vibrant, queer utopia where sports and community intersect. On Wednesday night, when they took a 2-0 lead over the Aces, it felt like a mix between a pride parade and a playoff game\u2014mostly because that\u2019s what it was. The dreams of members of the old guard like Colson, who have always hoped that the WNBA would be more than a league but a tool for activism and expression, don\u2019t feel so unrealistic when you enter Ballhalla. In fact, that activist spirit of inclusion is an organic and inextricable part of being there, and its reverberations not only are felt through the stands but also extend to the players themselves. It\u2019s not some abstract marketing gimmick. It\u2019s effervescent, felt, and worth nourishing and protecting. It\u2019s also lucrative. The Valkyries are the first women’s sports franchise to be valued at a billion dollars, and they generated $100 million in revenue this regular season alone. Not only has authenticity been profitable for them, but it\u2019s also a potential advantage in free agency, where they\u2019re in a position to create space for two max contracts this offseason.<\/p>\n

Mitchell\u2019s comments, on the other hand, awkwardly came after Fever COO Amber Cox\u2019s impassioned (and somewhat forced) defense of the fans at Gainbridge Fieldhouse, reminding reporters that no fan inside the arena has ever been found to have violated the code of conduct. \u201cThe attacks on our fan base have no basis in reality,\u201d Cox said, \u201cand they need to stop, especially with members of the media.\u201d It felt like an attempt to separate the online trolls from the real-life fans, who understandably bristle at being lumped in with racists.\u00a0<\/p>\n

I understand that instinct. I am one of the fans for whom Clark was an WNBA gateway drug. Some people just want to watch basketball, and their attachment to Clark has nothing to do with her race or sexuality and everything to do with how it feels when a human being performs the extended miracle of putting a round ball into a cylinder from far away, over and over again.<\/p>\n

But Cox\u2019s timing couldn\u2019t have been worse, and it suggests she\u2019s out of step with the feelings of Mitchell, her star free agent. That she\u2019s disconnected, at best, or indifferent, at worst. Multiple former Fever players, including<\/a> Bri Turner and Colson, have spoken out in response to that press conference. Natasha Harris, the wife<\/a> of Fever assistant coach Briann January\u2014the latter of whom felt the wrath of the internet when she got into a public argument with Clark\u2014posted an Instagram story saying, \u201cThe allegations can\u2019t be beat and the receipts have been kept!\u201d Ultimately, after a year in which the Fever\u2019s team-building abilities have justifiably come into question, the entire press conference felt like an attempt to save Cox\u2019s job. Ironically, it might be the final nail.\u00a0<\/p>\n

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Gabby Williams in Game 2 of the semifinals<\/p>\n

Getty Images<\/p>\n

In the WNBA, the line between the online and the offline experience has never felt more porous Mitchell can hear MVP chants at the arena and then go home to find Fever fans harassing her in her DMs. If you\u2019ve been subject to online harassment, you know how easily it can seep into your offline life. The internet is not real life until it is. The more nebulous a potential threat, the more ubiquitous. Years of this is long enough for perceptions to calcify.\u00a0<\/p>\n

To be fair, Fever players have also faced harassment at the hands of other fan bases. Myisha Hines-Allen has been called a race traitor (and worse) for doing what any enforcer would do<\/a>. Raven Johnson, after being shamed by fans online, apologized<\/a> for simply laughing along beside Hines-Allen in a press conference. Either way, being Black on the Fever has proved complicated.\u00a0<\/p>\n

With a new CBA set to reshape the league\u2019s financial landscape, players are poised to have more money, more options, and more leverage than ever before. For years, WNBA players had to make compromises about where they played and what they were willing to tolerate. But as salaries rise and expansion creates more opportunities, the calculus changes. Teams won’t just be competing to offer players the best basketball situation. They’ll also have to convince them that their culture is worth being a part of.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Mitchell is now at that crossroads as an unrestricted free agent for the first time in her career. I can understand why, after three years of experiencing the highs and lows of being in Clark\u2019s orbit, Mitchell could simply be exhausted and want to go elsewhere.\u00a0She has gained a lot from her proximity to Clark, including endorsements and fame, but the WNBA\u2019s new salary cap has evened the playing field for the other teams. To boot, while the league may be less popular without Clark, her absence is no longer an existential threat.<\/p>\n

Mitchell, or any other free agent, could conceivably go elsewhere without sacrificing what they’ve gained. The concessions asked of players in fraught team situations\u2014from compartmentalizing their feelings to shutting off parts of themselves\u2014are compromises that make sense only when there are no other options. For free agents like Mitchell, the options are plentiful, especially with more expansion teams incoming.\u00a0<\/p>\n

For the Fever, this is both a human problem and a recruiting problem. The Valkyries are not a one-off. Other teams, like the Toronto Tempo and Portland Fire, are trying to follow their blueprint of institutional competence and organic fan engagement. Golden State itself is a spinoff of what the Liberty have built. From a purely Machiavellian perspective, in an era of more empowered free agency and less restricted movement around the league, teams should be protecting their players and creating an atmosphere where they feel safe and welcomed.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s absurd and fascinating, one of those ripple effects you couldn\u2019t script, that the same logo 3 that convinced<\/a> Joe Lacob to pay the Valkyries\u2019 expansion fee could also inspire the racist, homophobic, and misogynistic insults lobbed at some WNBA players. The same shot garners very different responses, some magical and some poisonous. Three seasons into Clark\u2019s WNBA career, nobody really knows what to do with any of it.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s hard not to wonder what Clark makes of all of it. From very early on, it was clear to me that she cherished the opportunity to use her talent to spread the gospel of women\u2019s basketball. In her final season at Iowa, it gave her a clear sense of purpose beyond the highs and lows of winning and losing. It became her North Star, and I think that to stay true to that mission, she tried early on to appeal to as many people as possible. She was also young, still finding her voice. In that time, her personality became a blank canvas on which bad-faith actors projected their racist, homophobic, and misogynistic beliefs. Now, it seems like no matter how many times she tries to wipe it\u2014she has condemned people using her name to spread racist agendas multiple times just this season, including in her exit interview on Thursday\u2014it\u2019s become a stain she can\u2019t get off.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt makes you upset because you care about your teammates so much and you don\u2019t want any of them to go through something like that,\u201d Clark said in her exit interview. \u201cAs far as people that have used me to demonstrate racist rhetoric or hate or discrimination, that\u2019s not something I stand for. That\u2019s never been something I\u2019ve stood for. \u2026 It\u2019s not how I was raised, so that\u2019s really disappointing when people do that. \u2026 It makes me upset, makes me sad, makes me really disappointed because that\u2019s not who I am.\u201d<\/p>\n

The irony: The WNBA looks more fun than ever. This season, the Washington Mystics were making TikToks by night and drawing charges by day. Olivia Miles and Gabby Williams have become folk heroes for their respective cities. Natisha Hiedeman, one of the StudBudz, has been organizing run clubs in Seattle. ATL Barbie<\/a> just won Defensive Player of the Year. The Fever, meanwhile, remain bogged down by the very culture-war noise they\u2019ve tried to block out. Until they reckon with it, the greatest beneficiaries of the Caitlin Clark effect<\/a> may be elsewhere in the WNBA.<\/p>\n

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Seerat Sohi<\/p>\n

<\/a>Seerat Sohi covers the NBA, WNBA, and women\u2019s college basketball for The Ringer. Her former stomping grounds include Yahoo Sports, SB Nation, and basements all over Edmonton.