Good news for WNBA fans: the league that has been seen as the less-cared-about stepsister of the NBA is actually on the up. Attendance for the games are up, TV ratings are up by 20 percent, and WNBA.com has seen a spike in traffic. Merchandise sales are up 36 percent an the league’s 14 teams have seen 46 games sold out this season, too.
Reports are chalking it up to a few key points:
- There’s less NBA control over the WNBA…which is probably a good thing, since the men’s league doesn’t seem to have it’s act together. WNBA leadership are adding more non-NBA team owners to its rosters. Here in LA, we have two women owners of the LA Sparks who are the first to independently purchase a sports team — one’s a teacher, the other’s an attorney.
- There are a lot of exciting, new players. I mean, when the WNBA started, there were a ton of great players… many of them are STILL PLAYING. Look at Candace Parker (of the LA Sparks, of course), who was the second player to dunk in a regular-season game (Lisa Leslie was the first, of course)… can’t you hear the crowd chanting, Rookie of the Year?:
Then some of you may remember the big old fight earlier this season that suspended 10 players and Detroit assistant coach Rick Mahorn… lots of people were paying attention (that’s basically why people watch hockey, right?).
- I personally think WNBA.com traffic is up because the mainstream sports media doesn’t give an eff about women’s basksetball. Right now, the WNBA is playing their post season. Not one of the major sports websites have any results on the top of the fold of the front page right now. Granted, this is the last week of the regular season in baseball, too, so it’s very baseball-centric. Also, there were no WNBA games tonight, but the playoffs begin tomorrow with the Sparks playing the San Antonio Silver Stars and the NY Liberty playing the Detroit Shock. In fact NBC sports has an NBA news section lower on the page with noWNBA news — the NBA is out of season. The LA Times mentions the Sparks tonight… waaaaay down below. Check out screenshots of the top national sports sites below. Hopefully, the screenshots will be different tomorrow night after playoff games #1 for the east and the west.
Stop taking drugs. Seriously. If you’re slow, then you weren’t meant to be competing on the world stage. Get a real freaking job and stop dissapointing all Americans that you represent every time you dope up to be faster, better or stronger and then get caught full of steroids or whatever.
As a wee high school track star, I idolized Marion Jones. I wanted to be her. She was the fastest living woman in the world. How wicked was it to see her bolting through Sydney in 2000? As a 16-year-old sprinter with some promise, I loved her. She embodied the greatness that athletes can have — poise, determination, and a likeability factor that even now I can’t help but notice and feel sorry for when I see that she’s appealing for communication on her sentence by the president. (Yeah, good luck with that one, Marion. You are brown and you’re not one of the president’s cronies/henchmen).
The more I hear about our athletes (and a few from other countries) injecting stuff into their bodies, the more it makes me sad for the state of sports today. Olympic swimming hopeful Jessica Hardy’s 3 test results are up in the air, as her results have come up as positive-negative-positive. She was slated to compete in the 100-meter breaststroke, 50 freestyle, and 400 free relay. If the results are proven to be positive, Hardy faces a two year ban from competing.
So, Olympic athletes, let the guy from the Ukraine win, even if that means taking the bronze. As long as you don’t embarrass us in front of the whole world, then I really don’t care if you lose. It’s kind of annoying to see us winning ALL those medals anyway hehe
The younger Williams tennis phenom beat Francesca Schiavone in a second-round match at the German Open, bringing Serena her 16th straight win. In 2008, Serena is 20-1, and would score her 4th consecutive open title if she wins this tourney.
“I’m healthy. I’m focused. Tennis is my priority,” Williams told the AP after her win on Tuesday. “Everything is just coming together. Obviously, I would like to keep up the streak. I really want to keep it up on clay. I can slide on clay and be a little bit more lazy — I like that.”
You know, when I first heard about Danica Patrick, I thought she was going to be an awesome bastion of equality in sports and male-dominated fields such as NASCAR racing and stuff… until this exchange in Newsweek in 2006…
