Welcome to Basketball Insider, presented by The BIG EAST Conference. As I reviewed the WNBA All-Star Game rosters, I was struck by the gap between how angry everyone is about them and how closely they hew to what most people would consider the best players in 2026 so far.
Basketball Insider
I do have quibbles, to be sure. Rhyne Howard is on my MVP ballot if the season ends today, somewhere between 2-4, and she isn’t a starter. I’d have found a spot for Nia Coffey and Veronica Burton among the reserves, and no, this is not a Joe McKeown burner account.
Still, there aren’t any members of the All-Star squads who aren’t having stellar seasons, and there’s no one missing from the squad who is a clear and obvious top-10 player.
Now, did we get there in precisely the way everyone would like? No, I suppose not, when more than half the players failed to vote. But that feels less like a process that led to a terrible outcome and more like an alarm that can be sounded to avoid such a lull in participation in the future. A dedicated election day for all players to vote, with efforts to emphasize its importance from the league and the WNBPA alike, would go a long way toward solving this.
But the primary reason we are supposed to be so upset about this is either the idea that the proper players aren’t being honored, or the financial aspect of the teams — that there are bonuses based on earning All-Star berths.
This, too, strikes me as a very solvable problem! Either the current system is broken and needs fixing, or bonuses can simply be altered to conform to a mutually agreeable statistic instead. (Use tempo-free stats when you do it, friends!)
I had the privilege of voting in this year’s All-Star balloting among the media, and my only real complaint is that it’s time to end the “four backcourt, six frontcourt” count in my view. Even the coaches, The IX Sports learned, had a ballot which included wild cards to help select the reserves. My ideal would be starters picked with 10 slots, positionless, but any additional flexibility would be useful to ultimately select the 10 best players — which is the point of all this, as I understand it.
But the level of acrimony in certain areas — again, I implore you, spend less time on social media, it isn’t anything like the way this league is being consumed in real life — does not match, in my view, an actual problem here. Quite the opposite, really: people getting this engaged in seeing their favorite players recognized is a great sign of a widely-resonating league, just as I was delighted to see a massive, sellout crowd last Friday night at Barclays on the Friday of a holiday weekend. (The crowd here at Barclays Center on a Tuesday night as I write this is similarly massive, and reflects a very different reality from what Wings-Liberty weekday games looked like just a few years ago.)
And in less than three weeks, I expect a similar atmosphere in Chicago, a place that, let’s face it, could use some better women’s basketball vibes.
This week in women’s basketball
Jade Melbourne is blossoming before our eyes.
Caitlin Clark spoke about the past few weeks.
I am SO excited about our partnership with Marisa Ingemi’s Valkyries’ Beat.
Also, I am watching Awak Kuier as we speak, and my goodness she is a force.
Massive respect to the Connecticut Sun for honoring their legends while they can.
‘Rare Gems’ is out now!
Howard Megdal, founder and editor of The IX Basketball and The IX Sports, wrote this deeply reported book. “Rare Gems” follows four connected generations of women’s basketball pioneers, from Elvera “Peps” Neuman to Cheryl Reeve and from Lindsay Whalen to Sylvia Fowles and Paige Bueckers.
If you enjoy Megdal’s coverage of women’s basketball every Wednesday at The IX Sports, you will love “Rare Gems: How Four Generations of Women Paved the Way for the WNBA.”
Five at The IX: Jonquel Jones talks All-Star selection
Soccer: Annie Peterson, @AnnieMPeterson, AP Women’s Soccer
Tennis: Joey Dillon, @JoeyDillon, Freelance Tennis Writer
Basketball: Howard Megdal, @HowardMegdal, The IX Sports
Softball: Maren Angus-Coombs, @Maren-Angus, The IX Sports
Golf: Marin Dremock, @MDremock, The IX Sports
Hockey: @TheIceGarden, The Ice Garden
Gymnastics: Jessica Taylor Price, @jesstaylorprice, Freelance Writer
