Seen on my Lemur crawler... the WNBA will disband the Houston Comets, who won the first four seasons of the league, because they couldn't find a new owner.
Try to imagine that happening in any other league, um, ever. No, I couldn't either. David Stern, can you please step aside from your devouring of the hopes and dreams of Seattle basketball fans and end this thing, please?
There's a pretty fascinating piece in the NYT today (you will have to register to read it, but it's not a bad trade-off) about the role that society plays in gender differentiation. It's mostly about how less industrial societies have fewer gender differences than people in more industrial societies, since they are doing more similar jobs. But where it matters to us in this little corner of the blogosphere is how it relates to sports.
Running is mentioned as the perfect test case. It's a nearly universal sporting activity, and what you'd expect to happen -- i.e., males to be more competitive, and have greater separation from best to worst then females -- turns out to be the case on a damn near universal basis -- even in places where men and women have the same roles and jobs and fewer pronounced differences between genders. So there is, as per the study, an enduring "sex difference in competitiveness."
Now, I realize this is all a little dry, but the takeaway is this... in my lifetime, there has been an increasing amount of interest in women's team sports, with folks trying to get people interested in events like soccer and basketball.
It hasn't really worked from a ratings standpoint, with the occasional burst/fluke moment like the US women's soccer team, or the compromised effort that is beach volleyball, where you've got prurient interest adding to the competition. (I'm going to avoid talking about the individual events like golf, tennis, figure skating and gymnastics for the most part, because those seem to be more about individual personalities.)
Many people have posited that this is because of a lack of coverage, or the older generations not having grown up with the endeavor, or some other more nefarious plot, mostly involving patriarchy.
But what this study is showing you is that, on some level, there's just less variance in performance, independent of the culture. You can give me any reason you like as to why that is, but it doesn't really matter; the sun rises in the East, water is wet, and men have greater competitive differences.
Strong variances make for better viewing. When teams and athletes are similar in abilities and performance, you don't have upsets, drama, storylines; you have parity on an individual competitor basis, which is to say you've got a lot of the middle muddling about.
Sports is about seeing who is better, and feeling that the differences are not utterly random, and that the differences matter. Women's sports simply have less of that; you can juice it up all you like with all kinds of reverse engineering and marketing, but it is what it is.
And I wish it weren't so, being the father of daughters and someone who feels the odd twinge of guilt over the fact that my kids don't see Dad watching girls play sports. Moving on...
Hey, when the ladies of the hardwood throw down, and ex-Piston, Bullet and Sixer Thug Rick Mahorn is in the thick of it, you know I'm there, people. Along with the rest of the sports blogosphere, in all likelihood...
Update: Now with more video footage than 90% of my audience has ever watched of the WNBA. Lookie lookie, girl fight!
I was going to take a full miss on the NBA Draft this year, but then the sports blogosphere alerts came and made this image available, and who am I to turn a gift Sideshow in the mouth?
This is Robin Lopez, who has definite Juwanna Mann potential, and as that's my third WNBA reference in the past five days, I will now check to see if my nuts are still on my body.
Yup.
But only just.
For anyone who doubts the power of the Association as a top 3 league, I give you this fact... between Anderson Varaejo, Yannick Noah and Lopez, you have over a 10% chance in any NBA game of seeing a live-action Simpsons villain getting rotation minutes. What more could you want, really?
(Why a miss on the Draft? Because it honestly seemed like there's not much here this time. Color me unimpressed when the world thinks that several of the players in the lottery will be career back-ups. Even the top 2 picks of Rose and Beasley have obvious and startling holes. Rose can't shoot threes or free throws, which makes him Rajon Rondo, who was drafted in the 20s a few years ago. Beasley has the ever popular character issues, was listed three inches taller than reality, and will be a defensive sieve. Yum! I should have definitely written another 1500 words on this to make the site's long-suffering non-Association fans scroll furiously. Or, well, not.)
There is also this... I hate, hate, hate it when a team announces to its fans that it is tanking the year before the year even begins. And that is the only way that you can spin New Jersey trading a genuinely good player (Richard Jefferson, who admittedly will never put up his Playing With Jason Kidd numbers again) for two guys (Yi Jianlin and Bobby Simmons) who can't play, won't stay healthy, and will both be out of the Association in 3 years or less.
It's clear that the Nets are just clearing cap space to go after LeBron James, not that this ever works -- seriously, Nets fans, you do know that you're just getting suckered into a multiple year wait for a free agent signing that isn't going to happen. When a fan base is told, before the year even starts, that there is no hope for the year, and that assets are being sold off just to have cap space, that's reprehensible. It's fraud to charge full price for the tickets. As a Sixers fan, I feel very strongly about this: every fan base deserves to have the potential for hope before a season begins. What is your hope if you are a Nets fan -- that Devin Harris is somehow going to become Chris Paul? That Jianlin will somehow not be horrible? That Nenad Krstic will come again to exact Gandhi II-like justice?
Maybe I'm overstating the case here, and that Marcus and Sean Williams will emerge to give the team an exciting young nucleus, or that Vince Carter will decide to care and be the elder leader of the team. (Chance of this happening: Zero.) But in the meantime, the Nets should cut ticket prices. (Chance of this happening: Zero.)
So here it is, mid June -- the time-honored middle of the WNBA season. I've got nothing left to watch in terms of hoops, not unless you count that Olympic nonsense. And while the regular season has huge drama already -- will the Atlanta Dream ever win a game? Are the Connecticut Suns for real? Why aren't the Sacramento Monarchs better? -- I can't help but feel that something is missing.
Namely, where is the fantasy sports support?
Go to WNBA.com -- I know, you're there all the time, but go now anyway. What you won't find, amidst all of the thrilling video, breathtaking photography and gripping game accounts, is support for my fantasy sports jones. You won't find it on Yahoo or ESPN, either.
What's the meaning of this? If I weren't still outraged by the league's inevitable screw job of Seattle out of its beloved Storm -- especially heartbreaking given that team's encouraging 8-6 record after years in the wilderness -- my gast would be flabbered by this. Don't the powers that be know that despite the incredible teamwork of the world's best distaff ballers, statistics still matter... and that it's damned deadly difficult for all of us out here with our WNBA fantasy leagues to do this all by hand?
(I know it's bad blogger form to talk about your roto teams, but I have to just share here for a moment, and tell you just how much Cappie Poindexter of the Phoenix Mercury has meant to my team this year. The Rutgers guard has always been an all-around performer, but this year's 25.7 points a game, albeit only in the first 10 games of the season, is a huge reason why I'm just dominating my leauge. She's really combined with Diana Taurasi to make the Phoenix team fun to watch, and while they might not have the bigs to compete in the West, they have just been fantasy gold. Anyway, moving on.)
For the very few of you out there who aren't already in an WNBA fantasy league that someone's running by hand, let me give you a few pointers. First off, don't target assists. In the WNBA, since everyone moves the ball and isolation plays are rare, the difference in assists per game isn't as great as in the men's game. Even a Ticha Penicheiro won't give you more than one or two more dimes a game than a less accomplished point guard.
Second, since the games have eight less minutes than the men, you have to ratchet your statistical expectations down a little, and pro-rate players accordingly. Lisa Leslie's good for nearly 10 boards a game even in the smaller time, so you can see what kind of monster she's be with the full 48. (You've really got to give it up to Double L, coming back from pregnancy to dominate like this.)
Third, blocked shots are at an incredible premium, with only four players currently racking up more than 2 a game. You can see why so many people who play this game insist on an auction draft, so that the team with Lisa Leslie really has to make do with a short bench. It's just not a good league for a serpentine draft.
Earlier this year, the WNBA was giving a very cheap handjob kind of fantasy game, with single player head to heads, but dammit... my league goes 8 teams with 12 players, which means we're really going deep into the talent pool. I'd hate to see the level of play diluted by expansion, but it really would make a difference in having a better league.
Finally, I'd like to really thank site contributor The Truth for getting me into the WNBA fantasy league. His insistence that watching the WNBA would be just like rooting for the Lakers (especially Radmanovic and Gasol) in our NBA picks game, the payment of which is posting something spectacularly humiliating... well, it's given me a brand-new fantasy love, just in time for the summer dead season. Expect Great!
ESPN Headline:
Retired (WNBA Star Chamique) Holdsclaw Lost Interest In Game
You and us both, sister! (rim shot)
(One of a continuing series of Mostly True Stories of Bad Sports Fan Moments. The image choice is the best thing I can relate to the Sacramento Monarchs. Honestly.)
The WNBA.
With good seats available in
* * * * *
We chose a Saturday night game with the Monarchs vs. LA. I was hoping for just a touch of that Kings-Lakers NoCal-SoCal hate, but no such luck – booing, it would appear, is primarily a male trait. Mostly, the crowd cheered when Sacto scored and groaned when LA did, or just seemed happy to be in air conditioning for a few hours.
The building was about a third full, but Arco is a nice enough place that it did not seem too bad. The game was forgettable; lots of short jump shots and turnovers, with LA’s Lisa Leslie pretty much having her way. No one seemed to care that much, least of all my 4-year-old, who watched for a few minutes, got the gist that girls could do this too, and then did what she always does at games – pine for junk food.
There was, however, one striking moment of wonderfulness. With about 15 minutes left in the game and LA starting to pull away, the home team played its big hole card to get the crowd back into it. With a big drum roll, the announcer welcomed our special guest of the evening… NCAA Champion and Sacramento King Mateen Cleaves! (Wiki page for Cleaves on the click. Wow, the 2000 draft was a stone stinker.)
Now, on the off chance that you’ve forgotten Mateen… he’s a 12th-man kind of point guard, notable only for his off-the-charts bench celebrations in Kings-Lakers games of the era. Mateen could make a six-month-old golden retriever look calm and reserved. And here he was, the crowd rising from a refreshing nap to clap for him… and he’s shielding himself from the camera, like he has just been forced to do a perp walk in front of the media.
Ever hear the sound of 3,000 people who all stop clapping in a fit of embarrassment? I have. Now, back that up with the PR announcer going deeper for it. “Come on folks! Give it up for him! Sacramento King – Mateen – CLEAVES!” By the time it was done, Mateen looked like he was trying to figure out a way to crawl through the floorboards.
I’m sure that the NBA had a rough time in the early days. I admire, as a father of daughters, the fact that David Stern keeps trying to make women’s basketball a viable pro sport, even though I’m sure my kids will never go near that career path. People who get their jollies out of making WNBA jokes make me uncomfortable. It’s just too easy of a target, and it hints at an overall bad attitude towards women.
But I’m pretty sure that when being at your event makes Mateen Cleaves hide, you are decades away from being a real league.
In other news, I’m pretty sure Mateen cut my grass last week.
> A WNBA player was arrested in Jerusalem for assault after punching an opponent in a parking lot after a game.
One more step in the Glorious Road Towards Complete Equality!... but I, for one, won't be able to take the WNBA seriously until someone starts waving some guns around. This parking lot stuff sounds more like something Bob Pettit would do to George Mikan. (FTT's going the extra historical mile today.)
> Curt Schilling, aka Bloggy McBloggermouth, is now putting up one million dollars, with one pinky in his mouth, to say that The Bloody Sock Was Actually His Blood.
Two quick points on the Sock of Turin:
1) Of course it's your blood, you big girl. Cutting yourself, or having a a difficult menses, would get you what you needed to be The Pitching Roy Hobbs.
2) Speaking for the millions of non-Sox non-Yankee MLB fans that the World Wide Lemur barely seems to know exist...
