WE ARE BACK. I have spent most of my last week watching WNBA pre-season games, taking notes and updating WNBA predictions for this season. And let me say this, it’s good to be back. I love the NBA, but there is something special about the W.

The W is unique from a betting perspective. First off, the season is half the games of the NBA (slightly more this year), 40-minute games instead of 48, and dramatically fewer injuries and rest. All this leads to us bettors not being nearly as able to suck on the sweet, sweet tit of RAPM/EPM models. It’s very difficult for a model to attribute credit to specific players when two players could have 95% overlapping minutes for a full season. For example, Aliyah Boston played 1136 of her total 1236 minutes last season with Caitlin Clark. There’s far less public data in the WNBA than the NBA as well, and teams don’t have 5 full-time analytics people scouting the whole league at the same time. All this to say, knowing who is actually good becomes trickier, and one of my favourite things, ball knowledge, comes to the forefront. This is what makes betting the WNBA so fun in my opinion. A lot of it is how much you’re willing to know about the league, how closely you follow it and how well you understand it.

The NBA is in its parity era, hasn’t been a back-to-back winner since the Warriors in 2018, and a different franchise has won each of the last six titles. As of writing this, the Celtics and Cavs are down 0-2 as 60-win regular season teams in the second round. This season feels like the start of a new parity era in the W, after the last few years the Liberty and Aces have felt somewhat inevitable. By my count, six teams have a legitimate shot at winning the title this year, the betting odds have four teams grouped as near equal favorites this year.

Now to the topic at hand, the players who are going to shape the league. First, to define what I mean by “shape the league.” The way I’m thinking about it is two-fold: one, how wide are your tails of performance this season? A’ja Wilson is of course going to be very important for Vegas this year, but her outcome is quite predictable, barring health she won’t be worse than the 6th or 7th best player in the league, and very likely she’ll be number one or two. The second factor is how important are those tail outcomes to your team’s performance this season? Alexis Prince has long tails, she could not make a team and be fully out of the league, and she could be a solid rotation piece for PHX. But neither of those tails are going to have a dramatic impact on the Mercury season. So, the two factors are really how unpredictable is your impact this season, and how important is that result going to be to your team overall.

Indiana Fever: Caitlin Clark

OK this feels clickbaity, but I also think Caitlin is the clear swing for Indiana this season. I think it’s undeniable that Clark is a great player at this point, as a rookie she averaged 19.2 PPG and 8.4 AST on 58% TS, those are insane offensive numbers for any player, let alone a rookie. Clark’s rookie year with the additions of solid vets have rocketed the Fever’s expectations, Indiana’s Pythag wins in a 44-game season last year was roughly 18, their win total this year is 29.5. The market is pricing in roughly a 9-point jump in net rating for this team. In my opinion, this jump really only makes sense if you price Caitlin as a clear top-three player in the league, and the market clearly is, she’s the favorite for MVP.

I’m a bit skeptical Caitlin is this good currently. The other two top players in the league (A’ja Wilson and Napheesa Collier) are correctly the two clear favorites for Defensive Player of the Year. Caitlin is at best an average defender, who loses focus, struggles with physicality and battling through screens, and often gets caught in transition due to complaining to refs. For her to be a top-three player in the league, she’s going to have to be by margin the best offensive player in the league. I think that’s entirely possible, she has a chance to be the best offensive player in WNBA history, but she still has some flaws in her game. She turned the ball over more than any high-level offensive player in the league on a per-play basis last year. She also shot 53% from two last year, but a lot of that was driven from a well-above-average shooting percentage from mid-range, not something I’m sure projects to continue going forward. I think it’s plausible that Clark is an elite but not one-of-one offensive player this season, who is just OK on D and is around the 8th best player in the league. If that’s the case, Indiana is not the second-best team in the league (where they’re projected), and will not win the championship. I also think it’s plausible that I’m an idiot, and Clark is a transformational player, maybe the best we’ve ever seen in the WNBA, and this is the true start of her run with a very solid team around her. If I had to make a call today, it would be the former, not the latter, but we shall see.

Las Vegas Aces: Jewell Loyd

Vegas swapped Loyd for Plum in the offseason, and to maintain championship equity they’re going to need this exchange not to be a big drop. Unfortunately for Vegas, Loyd has quietly been pretty bad for the past few seasons. Last year, playing with a reasonable offensive talent surrounding her, she shot 27.4% from 3 on 5.8 attempts a game, and 40% from 2. Plum, in a down year last year, was 56.3% TS while carrying a 24.8 USG%, while Loyd’s USG was at 28.8%. The bull case for Loyd is she now is the fourth on-ball option after being the clear number one (at least in her head) in Seattle. Loyd has always been a much better off-ball shooter than on-ball creator, and she could thrive in that role for a team with lots of creation. Preseason has been a mixed bag—against Dallas she took a bunch of bad middies, 0 shots at the rim and only two threes. Against Phoenix it looked much better—got tons of open catch-and-shoot threes that she took with confidence, only one middy, and a couple shots in the upper paint. Vegas needs Loyd to be a stud for them to try to continue this dynasty and win another ring.

Minnesota: Kayla McBride

This wasn’t a great team to pick from in terms of swing pieces. They’re all pretty established vets and have very little turnover. I could have chosen Diamond Miller here, who was a top pick a few years ago and still has some upside, but I don’t think she figures to feature much this year. As for McBride, she had by far her most efficient season of her career at age 32, increasing her 3pt rate by 5% from the season prior and increasing her 3pt% by 4% above her career average. I think it’s fair to assume she’s going to regress a bit here, but assuming she doesn’t hit a big decline due to age, McBride and Minnesota should be fine.

Phoenix Mercury: Satou Sabally

Now to my favourite team and favourite player. I can’t wait to watch Satou this year and Phoenix as a whole. Satou is a fascinating player—she was fifth in MVP in 2023, was out most of last year due to a shoulder injury and just wasn’t nearly as good as she was in her 2023 season. I thought she was noticeably in worse shape last year after returning from the injury, and her stats were propped up some by 45.2% from three (12% above her career average). That being said, I think Satou is in for a huge year. In my view, Satou is the fourth most likely player to win MVP this season (behind the obvious three). She is finally out of the clutches of Arike, the most selfish player in the WNBA, and out of the mess that was and is the Dallas Wings. Despite having a top-five MVP finish, Satou still has a lot of potential growth. She’s the prototypical WNBA star—an athletic four with great size, shooting ability, some handling and self-creation, solid vision for her size as well. She also looks to be in good shape watching her first preseason game. It was also noticeable that PHX knows what they have in Satou (Dallas sadly did not)—she led the team with a 33% usage, she was clearly encouraged to bomb from three, including taking a 30-footer. I need Tibbets to drill in self-belief into Satou—she needs to know if she wants to, she can be the best player in the league. Don’t pick up your dribble when someone pressures you on a drive—play through it, they’re not taking the ball from you! My only other question for Satou is I think she’s a bit big and not quite the side-to-side mover to be guarding fast wings/guards, which she’s going to need to do with PHX starting two bigs behind her. Overall, I am so excited to watch PHX and Satou, and she is my dark horse MVP this season.

New York Liberty: Leo Feibech

I considered writing on Breanna Stewart here—quietly had a drop in scoring and efficiency last year and has clearly lost her crown as the second-best player in the league. She is also heading into her age-30 season and had knee surgery in the summer. But the Liberty won the title being led by Stewie last year, and she was still awesome so for now I’ll assume she’s going to be the Stewie we know.

Feibech last season went from a great story for the Liberty early in the season to a key piece to their finals team. She averaged 21 MPG in the regular season—that jumped to 35.5 in the finals, averaging 13 points on ridiculous three-point shooting. She now is going to have to play a pivotal role if the Liberty want to repeat. The team is pretty set at guard with Cloud, Sabrina, and Marine Johannes coming off the bench, and is set in the frontcourt with Stewie and Jones, but the wing position is quite barren with Betnijah Laney out for the year. Leo will likely fit into the starting three spot, and if she can contribute what she did last year, I think Liberty are the clear championship favorite. For Leo, it’ll really come down to the three-point shooting—last season she was 5th in 3P% for any player averaging over two per game. But we’re dealing in small samples here—she’s only played around 1100 minutes in the W and shot a total of 175 threes. Leo has been a good shooter in Europe, but for a team that lost Laney and Stewie’s three-point shooting falling off, they need Leo to maintain as an elite three-point bomber. I say she does it.

Seattle Storm: Gabby Williams

Seattle essentially is swapping out Loyd for Williams this year. Gabby did play for Seattle last year but only joined with 12 games left in the season. I think this is a far less extreme drop-off than the general consensus. As I’ve already written, Loyd wasn’t great last year, and Gabby, despite being a lesser creator than Loyd, can help in a ton of ways. The thing about Williams is her last two years for SEA have been polar opposite small samples. In 2023, she averaged 8.4 PPG shooting 41% from 2 and 21.7% from three in 10 games, and in 2024 she averaged 10.3 PPG shooting 54.8% from two and 32.3% from three. Seattle is going to be a defensive monster, they’re strong at every position, and Ezi Magbegor is a dark horse DPOY candidate (I have bet on her for this award). That being said, they are going to need some offense with the departure of Loyd, and I think 2024 Gabby is a much better reflection of her actual ability, but SEA will really struggle on offense if her season is closer to what happened in 2023.

Atlanta Dream: Rhyne Howard

Rhyne Howard is very much the Cade Cunningham of the WNBA this season. Both first overall picks coming into their fourth year, great body and size for their positions, have put up box score stats, but two players who really haven’t contributed to winning to this point in their career. Cade ended up having a clear breakout season, came third in MIP (Rhyne is the favorite in that market for the W), led his team to the playoffs and looks to be an up-and-coming star. I think Rhyne does have that potential—you watch her play, she gets off her shot quickly, has a good handle for her size and moves very well. The thing is, her shots don’t go in. After being a 38% three-point shooter in college on huge volume, she’s only shot it at 34% in the W, and last year was her worst year of her career from beyond the arc, shooting 32.9%. As an idea, Rhyne profiles as a high-level 1B type player on a very good team who can play both on and off-ball, score a ton, and has the size and movement to defend. I think the D is there, but the offense just has not been where it needs to be. Last year, she only shot 59.7% at the rim (well below league average), and she shot 20 more mid-range shots than shots at the rim. Everything I have seen and read from the new Dream coach I have liked, and I think some spacing and additional offensive talent will help. Rhyne’s first preseason game was a mixed bag—she took 11 shots, 9 of them were threes and one was a foot-on-the-line mid-ranger, 0 shots at the rim. With the new bigs on ATL, I think Rhyne upping her three-point volume makes sense, but she’s going to have to make them at a higher rate. I still believe Rhyne can be awesome, but this year is a key one to prove it.

LA Sparks: Rickea Jackson

Another player who I am very high on and love her game. The real question for her this season is how good can she be. Despite getting much less attention than Angel and Caitlin, Rickea had a great rookie year. After a solid start to last year, she took off in the back half of the year, averaging 16.4 PPG in her last 20. Rickea is big, super athletic for her size, can shoot, and is confident in her stroke. My two big questions for Rickea this year are: one, can she improve as a passer? She only averaged 1.5 AST last year and gets blinders often when she has the ball. Two, can she up her physicality? Rickea is an awesome rim finisher, shooting 68% at the rim last year. The only issue was she took as many shots from the upper paint as she did at the rim. Jackson has a habit of cutting her drives short, putting her foot in the ground, and taking a leaning two from 5–6 feet. It’s not a bad shot, and it’s not something she should never go to, but I do think she shied away from contact at points last season. This is all to be expected from a rookie, and Jackson has mega-upside, but if she really wants to be a star, she’s going to have to up her passing some and increase the physicality in her game.

Chicago: Angel Reese

Honestly, I’m not sure what I think of Angel Reese. Her offensive REB% was 16.9% last year—second in the league was 13.2%, and only 4 players were above 10%. She is by margin the best offensive rebounder in the WNBA. She also shot 47% at the rim last year—she is by margin the worst rim finisher in the WNBA. Out of players who shot over 2 rim FGA per game last year, she was the only player below 50%. Second-last was Isabelle Harrison at 53.1%. Angel also lead the league in rim FGA attempts with 8.4 per game. Of course, these stats are all somewhat related—she rebounds so many of her own misses and that creates a bit of a feedback loop where she misses, grabs the rebound, misses, grabs the rebound, etc. But Angel is 6'3"—she cannot have a worse rim FG% than every guard in the league. There is some talk that she’s going to bring the ball up and shoot threes and create. I liken this to running before you can walk. Angel needs to focus on one thing and one thing only: finishing around the rim. She currently just doesn’t seem to have the ability to score when she is facing the basket and someone is in front of her—she is actually much better at finishing through contact on her side, like she showed with her highlight in Chicago’s preseason game against the Lynx. Angel is fascinating—she is a transcendent offensive rebounder, but also has some of the biggest holes in her game out of anyone in the league. I think she is the perfect example of a player with massive tails, and I’m too dumb to predict how and where it’s going to go.

Dallas Wings: Paige Bueckers

I considered writing Arike Ogunbowale here, with the swing being if they finally decide to trade her. Paige is really all that matters for this Dallas team right now. They’re not nearly good enough to compete and won’t be until it’s Paige’s team. I’m not going to write much on Paige—she looked awesome in her first preseason game. I think she faces some of the same issues Caitlin struggled with early in her career, specifically physical athletic defenders. But she has so much talent she’ll figure it out.

Washington: Shakira Austin

Honorable mention: Emily Engstler, who put up some serious per-minute stats last year and I think maybe has some juice.

Oh Shakira Austin, how I can’t quit you. Shakira is coming into her fourth season and has played only 40 more regular-season minutes than Caitlin in her career. Shakira is huge, and mega athletic for her size. She’s smart and aggressive (sometimes too agreesive) on D. She has some handling ability, got to the line 4.5 times per game in only 20 MPG last season. She struggled badly from the field last year in a tough offensive environment, but I think there is a path for her to become a stud—she just needs to play. Sadly, she has been injured for most of the past two seasons, and she currently is missing preseason games due to another injury. The swing here is just can she stay healthy, and I am very hopeful that she does and Washington surprises some people this year.

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The Sun and Valkyries both suck so bad they don’t get a feature in here. Both teams are so early in their rebuild that it’s just a hope to get a good pick this year. Will be interesting if Mabrey ends up getting dealt somewhere good.

This was very fun to write, and I cannot wait for the games to start mattering. If you are a person who hates the NBA resting, lack of compete in regular season, I heavily recommend watching the WNBA. I love the NBA, but these pre-season games are more intense than NBA regular season games in March.

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