Although athletes who say they are “in the best shape of their life” after a long offseason are not trustworthy, the often-overlooked WNBA had a strong claim to cliché before their 24th birthday.
After a hard-fought five-game final in 2019, the league saw one of its most dramatic free agency periods, as the confusion of top players like Skylar Diggins-Smith and DeWanna Bonner created an almost entirely new field of competition. The WNBA welcomed point guard Sabrina Ionescu, a triple-double phenomenon and one of his busiest prospects in years, and most notably the players got a new collective bargaining agreement that allowed the average WNBA player to win six figures for the first time, including salary base and incentives. It is common for players to compete throughout the year by going abroad during the off-season to earn additional money.
[Coming Friday: capsule previews for all 12 teams.]
“It was a long overdue progress,” said Dawn Staley, a Hall of Fame member who spent eight seasons in the league and now coaches the University of South Carolina women’s basketball team. “It’s not that playing in the W wasn’t a real profession before, but you no longer have to supplement your income in the same way. You have options. “
“We were seeing tremendous momentum for the WNBA and women’s sports in general,” WNBA Commissioner Cathy Engelbert told the New York Times. “Obviously, we hit the pandemic.”
Suddenly, that optimism, which is already rare in a league that is still forced to defend its own existence, evaporated. The players, scattered around the world with their teams abroad, were quick to find a way back to the United States, and league officials began to question whether they could host a season.
“It’s like a curse, we’ve come this far this year and this happens,” said Aerial Powers, a striker for defending champion Washington Mystics. “Not having a season would have been horrible, we don’t want to go back.”
But in mid-June, the WNBA had announced plans for a shortened 22-game season, starting with three games on Saturday, played exclusively at the IMG Academy in Bradenton, Florida. The league would function in the so-called bubble: Players and staff had to remain isolated full-time for three months, from training camp to the postseason, and play without crowds.
However, preparing to play in what is now called the “Wubble” in quarantine had its challenges. Often players had no room to exercise; Unlike some of their NBA peers, most can’t afford fancy gyms and home courts, a disparity illustrated by remote HORSE competition between leagues in April.
Many WNBA players don’t have a hoop at home, meaning they haven’t played a basketball in weeks when they were able to start preparing for the season last month. “Going from zero to 100 after three months off … is different,” Powers said. “Today was like the first day I thought, ‘OK, this feels a little bit better. I’m ready to play “.
However, the W is seeing some surprising benefits from the unorthodox setup. The fact that players were forced to rest under the circumstances gave many players used to playing professionally throughout the year a much-needed break. Due to the current shortage of live television programming, nearly 50 percent of WNBA’s regular-season games will be televised nationwide on ABC, ESPN, ESPN2, or the CBS Sports Network. This is a victory for a league that has long had to compete on television with the men’s professional leagues, and has often lost.
The coronavirus outbreak>
Frequent questions
Updated July 23, 2020
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What will school be like in September?
- Many schools are unlikely to return to normal hours this fall, requiring the routine of online learning, impromptu child care, and delayed work days to continue. California’s two largest public school districts, Los Angeles and San Diego, said July 13 that instruction will be remote only in the fall, citing concerns that rising coronavirus infections in their areas pose too serious a risk to students and teachers. Together, the two districts enroll about 825,000 students. They are the largest in the country so far to abandon plans for a partial physical return to classrooms when they reopen in August. For other districts, the solution will not be an all-or-nothing approach. Many systems, including the country’s largest New York City, are devising hybrid plans that involve spending a few days in classrooms and other days online. There is no national policy on this yet, so check with your municipal school system regularly to see what’s going on in your community.
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Is the coronavirus in the air?
- Coronavirus can remain in the air for hours in tiny droplets in stagnant air, infecting people as they inhale, growing scientific evidence suggests. This risk is highest in crowded interior spaces with poor ventilation, and may help explain overcast events reported in meat packing plants, churches, and restaurants. It is unclear how often the virus is transmitted through these small droplets or sprays, compared to the larger droplets that are expelled when a sick person coughs or sneezes, or is transmitted through contact with contaminated surfaces, Linsey said. Marr, Virginia Tech aerosol expert. Aerosols are released even when a symptom-free person exhales, speaks or sings, according to Dr. Marr and more than 200 other experts, who have summarized the evidence in an open letter to the World Organization. Of the health.
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What are the symptoms of coronavirus?
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What is the best material for a mask?
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Does Covid-19 transmit asymptomatic?
- So far, the evidence seems to show that it does. A widely cited article published in April suggests that people are most infectious approximately two days before the onset of coronavirus symptoms, and estimated that 44 percent of new infections were the result of transmission from people who still had no symptoms. Recently, a senior expert at the World Health Organization stated that transmission of the coronavirus by people without symptoms was “very rare,” but later withdrew that claim.
The teams are often not together for training camp due to the overseas players’ schedules, but this year they have spent an unusual amount of time playing together and socializing. His conversations have often focused on the social justice movements and protests that have been taking place across the country since the murder of George Floyd; This season of the WNBA is dedicated to Black Lives Matter and Say Her Name.
“Being able to have these kinds of conversations with everyone in the same place, get all these different perspectives, it’s so unique and great,” said Atlanta Dream center Elizabeth Williams.
However, making the most of the initial promise of the season is only possible on the court, where thanks to extraordinary measures, the players have finally been able to return. “There was a sense of calm about being back on the floor,” Williams said. “A lot of what happened felt like a loss of control, but that space was safe.”
