It’s trade season in the professional hoops world, and over the past few weeks we’ve been given an absolute feast of transactions to devour. Yes, Luka is a Laker, but the movement around the WNBA since free agency officially began on February 1 has also been staggering. We started off with Jewell Loyd getting out of Seattle and Brittney Griner saying goodbye to the only WNBA franchise she’s ever known. Somehow, things have only gotten more wild from there.
We have totally new rosters, including two that could be considered “superteams,” and a few aimless squads that seem like they’re still in hibernation from the winter. So now that we have a slew of signatures officially on contracts and an almost unfathomable amount of social media chatter, let’s dive into the winners and losers of WNBA free agency so far.
Winner: The Phoenix Mercury Are Coming out of Retrograde
Ahead of free agency, it would have been easy to think that the Mercury were going to continue their yearslong backslide since their 2021 Finals appearance. Diana Taurasi was mulling retirement, the team had just finished below .500 for the third consecutive season, and there were plenty of questions about its aging rotation. So when Griner announced on IG that she would be leaving the only W franchise she’d ever known to take her talents across the country to the Atlanta Dream, the doomsday bells could have started ringing.
Instead, the Phoenix brass went about constructing a series of trades that made me grip my phone tighter and tighter as the news came through. The Merc pried Alyssa Thomas from the Connecticut Sun before beating the New York Liberty, the reigning champions, to land Satou Sabally. Now, instead of spinning its wheels in purgatory, Phoenix appears to have built another superteam overnight around Thomas, Sabally, and Kahleah Copper.
It might be smart to hold off on calling the Merc the definitive winners of free agency—plenty of people did that last year with the Storm, and even though they finished third in the Western Conference, those proclamations didn’t exactly pan out. But the path to the Finals for everyone outside the Valley just got a bit harder—especially New York, who will be heartbroken that Sabally opted to head to the Southwest instead of rejoining her Oregon teammate Sabrina Ionescu. Landing the former Wing could have set the Liberty on a dynastic run. Now they have another team to worry about in the playoffs.
Winner: The Atlanta Dream’s Frontcourt
Phoenix isn’t the only team that folks should be worried about. It was incredible to watch BG sign a one-year deal with Atlanta and announce her move in an Unrivaled hoodie (as long as your name isn’t Cathy Engelbert). After the Kelsey Plum–Loyd trade, this was the second sign that we might be in for a more interesting offseason than fans thought—many had believed that we’d have to wait for next year to get some real chaos.
The Dream weren’t done, either, picking up 2022 Sixth Player of the Year and three-time All-Star Brionna Jones from the Sun. The addition gives Atlanta a jumbo-sized quartet of 6-foot Allisha Gray, 6-foot-2 Rhyne Howard, 6-foot-3 Jones, and 6-foot-9 Griner. It will be interesting to see how Jones and Griner fit together in Atlanta, given that both seem more comfortable patrolling the paint and playing with their backs to the basket. And, as many pundits have pointed out, this isn’t exactly how new Atlanta coach Karl Smesko preferred his Florida Gulf State teams to play. But when you’re blessed with two elite bigs, it’s best not to look a gift horse in the mouth.
And judging by how Howard has been flexing on social after all the moves, I don’t think the Dream are sweating the configuration issues, either. The only person who may be worried about all the bonds being made at Unrivaled games in Miami may be …
Loser: Cathy Engelbert’s Winter
Look, many people take the winter to realign, reassess, and relax until the bleak, snow-filled days give way to sunshine and beach plans. Unfortunately for Engelbert, Unrivaled has been on her ass since the new women’s three-on-three league tipped off in January.
Players have gleefully talked about the amenities that Unrivaled offers them in Miami, and, as mentioned above, there seems to be an amount of tampering—seriously, how many times do we think Engelbert watched BG’s free agency announcement?—that would make the USA Olympic teams blush. Can we actually prove that tampering is happening? No. But when Unrivaled players are moving around their WNBA teams so much, it’s hard not to wonder what’s going down in “Tamper Bay.” Hell, one of the founders of the league is saying the quiet part out loud to anyone who will listen.
There’s a saying that all press is good press, but that’s a myth. During a time when everyone should be talking about their excitement for the upcoming WNBA season and the free agency madness, the common sentiment seems to be that the W is missing its moment and letting a league that JUST STARTED suck up all the attention.
I’m not even sure what Engelbert can do to change the narrative. After she’s spent years talking about improving conditions around the league, many teams still don’t have women-specific practice facilities, some players don’t have their own lockers, and one of the W’s brightest stars is essentially calling out her franchise for its lack of investment. As a small start-up, Unrivaled obviously faces fewer obstacles than a league with more than a dozen teams that have to manage weekly travel, a longer season, varying financial investments, and larger rosters, but it’s fair to say that Unrivaled’s successful launch and the sustained interest among hoopheads should worry the WNBA commissioner. Don’t believe me? Just search “Cathy” and “Unrivaled” on Twitter and see what pops up.
Winner: Indiana Reaching a Fever Pitch
Really, this should be a “loser” designation for anyone who’s tired of hearing about the Fever. Alas, the new GM and head coach tandem of Amber Cox and Stephanie White got to work immediately, inking Kelsey Mitchell to an extension and keeping one of the league’s best long-range volume shooters in Indianapolis. Of the six players who made at least 100 3s last season, Mitchell ranked second in percentage at 40.2, narrowly behind flamethrower Kayla McBride.
And while many people thought that DeWanna Bonner would follow her fiancée, Alyssa Thomas, to Phoenix, the two-time champion decided to zag and sign with Indiana. And just in case you were thinking, “Hey, Indy’s rotation has a lot of shooting but is a little suspect on the other end,” Cox went ahead and brought back 2019 Defensive Player of the Year Natasha Howard, who’d played for the Fever in 2014 and 2015, to hold it down alongside Aliyah Boston in the frontcourt. Oh, and they got Sophie Cunningham from the Mercury.
From an outsider’s perspective, it looks like the Fever have collected all the Infinity Stones necessary to vault themselves into contention. As Winsidr’s Myles Ehrlich pointed out, Howard’s ability to pick-and-pop with Caitlin Clark and partner with Boston in the paint will make Indiana a constantly changing problem for opponents. Stopping Clark and Mitchell on the perimeter was already hard enough once they’d worked the kinks out last season. Now opposing teams have to contend with defending them, Bonner, Boston, Howard … and Indiana’s incredibly deep bench. If I were an opposing coach who had to watch the Fever take Clark and Bonner out, only for Lexie Hull and Cunningham to check in, I would start researching alternative career choices.
Indiana really hit its stride after the 2024 All-Star break. Clark got some much-needed time off to relax and reevaluate her game. Now she’s in year two and suddenly surrounded by one of the most complete teams in the league. If people thought the chatter around Indiana was loud last year, it will be cacophonous in 2025.
Loser: The Sun Setting in Connecticut?
Let’s take a quick second to shed a tear for Natasha Cloud, who was sent from Phoenix to Connecticut in the Thomas deal after previously praising the Mercury’s new facilities and saying she would “run through a wall for this fucking organization.” Safe to say she won’t be getting those kinds of amenities in Uncasville.
Let’s recap the Sun’s offseason. Maybe take a deep breath first. After taking the Minnesota Lynx to a decisive Game 5 in the semifinals, they’ve lost their head coach and ENTIRE starting five. Thomas is in Phoenix, Bonner is in Indiana, Jones is in Atlanta, and DiJonai Carrington and Ty Harris are in Dallas. It’s not all bad news for Connecticut, who retained Marina Mabrey and picked up Tina Charles and Cloud, but this is clearly a teardown.
Bringing in Jacy Sheldon is good business for a team that has a history of acquiring Dallas Wings guards and turning them into contributors. And after losing Thomas and Jones, Sun fans can rejoice in having former Connecticut no. 1 overall pick Charles back with the team. The UConn alum won her MVP award with the Sun all the way back in 2012, which is a nice bit of symmetry for a team desperately searching for good vibes. Connecticut hasn’t missed the playoffs since 2016, but if I were a betting man, I’d tell Sun fans to strap in for a rough season.
Winner: Homecomings
It’s truly the offseason of homecomings in the W. I’ve already mentioned how Charles and Natasha Howard returned to the teams that drafted them, but possibly the happiest return of all will be Courtney Vandersloot’s Chicago homecoming.
Vandersloot was selected by the Sky with the third pick in the 2011 draft and became a fixture in Chicago. You could regularly tune in to Sky games and watch Sloot whip a pass past an unsuspecting defender’s head, and it broke many fans’ hearts when she went to the Liberty in 2023. But after being relegated to a sixth woman role during New York’s run to the championship, last week Vandersloot decided to return to the Windy City.
This is huge news for Angel Reese, who needed a pure point guard to feed her the ball in the post. Vandersloot is the only player on the Sky's current roster who averaged more than two assists per game last year, so expect plenty of flashy entry passes and hit-aheads from the General. And does this mean we’ll see her wife and former teammate, Allie Quigley, coaxed out of hiding? I’m not so sure, but if this means we could get one of the best sharpshooters in league history back, everyone should write a personal thank-you letter to Sloot. Long live the Vanderquigs.
Loser: Rhyne Howard’s Haters
Finally, not to come back to the Dream for too long, but Rhyne Howard has been having an absolute blast on Twitter. I guess your team signing two of the best bigs in the league will do that to you. Also, her video editing abilities are incredible. Share your CapCut skills, Queen!
