Tea Time with Matt Ellentuck: The Seattle Storm are WNBA Champions

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Skylar Smith and Brian Bosche chat with Matt Ellentuck, a WNBA Reporter that runs the popular “Here’s Basketball” newsletter about women’s basketball. They discuss the the Seattle Storm winning the WNBA Championship over the Las Vegas Aces, Breanna Stewart winning another Finals MVP, Sue Bird setting records at 39, takeaways from the season, and what the WNBA can learn from the Wubble experience.

Full Transcript:

Skylar Smith:
Hi everyone, and welcome back to High Tea Hoops.

Brian Bosche:
High Tea Hoops.

Skylar Smith:
Nice, Brian. We're back with our Wednesday Tea Time Show, with Skylar, the Duchess of Hoops, here with Brian, the Duke of Hoops, as always. Hi, Brian.

Brian Bosche:
Hello.

Skylar Smith:
We're very happy this morning, I was just about to ask how you are...

Brian Bosche:
I'm very happy, I'm giddy.

Skylar Smith:
We know how you are. We're here today with the man, the myth, the legend, the King of WNBA Twitter, in my brain, Matt Ellentuck. Matt, how's it going?

Matt Ellentuck:
Hello friends, I appreciate it. What's going on?

Brian Bosche:
Are we gonna tell-

Skylar Smith:
Thank you so much for being here.

Brian Bosche:
Are we gonna tell Ari and Meredith that we called Matt, the King of WNBA Twitter? We had them on too, Matt. We did a WNBA playoff preview with Meredith, and then Ari came on pretty early on. Maybe they won't listen to this, who knows?

Skylar Smith:
Who knows?

Matt Ellentuck:
No, come on, those are the GOATs. Meredith and Ari, please. Absolute Queens of WNBA Twitter.

Skylar Smith:
Yeah, I'm not taking away from Meredith and Ari by calling Matt the King of WNBA Twitter, come on Brian.

Brian Bosche:
Sorry, sorry.

Matt Ellentuck:
We can all exist, Brian, we share a throne, okay?

Brian Bosche:
I stack rank everything

Skylar Smith:
He really does. Matt, how about you just start off by telling us a little bit about your background.

Matt Ellentuck:
Sure, I've been a basketball weirdo, probably since birth and I think... My parents would probably tell you, I think when I was in fourth grade I was like "I want to be a basketball journalist" like a freaking weirdo, I don't know who says that.

Brian Bosche:
That early? That's crazy.

Matt Ellentuck:
Yeah. Really, I've known what I've wanted to do for forever and, listen, I caught a couple of lucky breaks. I went to school at Maryland, and I stayed in the area and wound up working for SB nation after interning there for a bit, and that was my home for my entire pro career so a little over four years until the pandemic earlier this year. Sucked, not a fan personally, unfortunately a lot of us lost jobs so since then I started a Substack to continue covering WNBA, because this is season number five for me, and I knew I was going to stay doing this in some capacity, so I'm happy that I was able to find a platform there. I've done a little bit of freelance for the New York Times also, which is great, so I got to keep doing what I like to do so it worked out.

Brian Bosche:
Yeah, and if you haven't yet, go subscribe, go find his newsletter, it's incredible. That's where I get all of my color for the WNBA, everything going on, it's been great to read, Matt.

Matt Ellentuck:
I appreciate you.

Skylar Smith:
Yeah, Matt's newsletter is called Here's Basketball. Matt what's it been like producing this newsletter... this has kind of started since the pandemic, right?

Matt Ellentuck:
Yeah, I guess I launched it right after I got furloughed, because we kind of knew what was coming, so we were all looking for the next pivot, and I feel like Substack was the hot journalist thing at the time, as we were all getting knocked off our full-time jobs. I started it right after, and I had no idea what I was doing. I was just an emotional mess at the time and I was like "I don't know, subscribe to this, it might work, it might not, I don't know." It was free at the time so I was like "Just put your email down, I'm going to figure this out when I stop having a mental breakdown." I [inaudible 00:03:43] for a while and I planned a bit, and I've been really impressed with how it's grown. I think Substack is just a wonderful platform that's, not only helped me, it's helped a lot of people in the field, and especially still covering women's sports, since a lot of us are honestly the first to lose our jobs. It's been great, it's grown, I feel like I've been able to do the things I still wanted to do from a production standpoint of putting more information out about this league, getting more people involved in the league, explaining what's going on and what happened in the past, how to get you started, it's been wonderful.

Skylar Smith:
Nice, I feel like you are the keeper of the information on WNBA Twitter. I remember when... We were going into playoffs, and there were all these confusing, possible situations, possible outcomes that could be happening based on all the outcomes of the game. And I feel like all of WNBA Twitter was going to your newsletter to try to work through it, and I would be updating your Twitter trying to get updates like "Okay, this team won so what does this mean? ..." Do you just feel so powerful?

Matt Ellentuck:
No, I'm an idiot, so here's the thing. Throughout the whole... It was the final few days, and it was just so complex this year because there were only 22 games in the season, and every team was somehow still in the playoff picture. And it was a couple days out and I'm like "All right, the last day of the season is on Sunday, by Thursday I'll give everybody a weekend primer of "Here's what to watch, here's how your team gets in." And then I started doing... I'm contacting all the PR people from each different team, and they're just as confused as I am, and then I'm asking more round two questions and they're like "Matt, just stop. I don't know, it's too many days away, please pack this up." Eventually, hopefully I got everything right, I think I was pretty accurate with it, but it was just a lot and I really hope we don't have a 22 game season anymore, because the tiebreaker scenarios, it was too much.

Brian Bosche:
Yeah, when we were preparing for the podcast with Meredith Minkow on the playoff preview, Scott and I were pouring through your email going like "Wait, there's a reseeding after the single elimination? What does that mean, and we had no idea going into that pod, we're like "Whatever, the Storm are going to win.

Matt Ellentuck:
[inaudible 00:06:17] the last two games and I was like "That's a little mysterious." The ending came out how we thought it would.

Brian Bosche:
Yes it did. Sorry, I'm going to try not to be insufferable on this podcast. It's been hard because I've been talking trash about the storm all season.

Matt Ellentuck:
That's my staple so don't worry about it.

Skylar Smith:
I have to rein him in every... Because it's every pod that we talk about WNBA he's just non-stop about the Storm and I'm like "We have to give other teams a fair shake here Brian." But then at this point-

Brian Bosche:
Sorry. It's caused tensions and-

Skylar Smith:
We can be a full Storm podcast.

Brian Bosche:
It's caused tensions between the Duke and Duchess in our pre-pod meetings, but it's all right we've worked through it.

Matt Ellentuck:
Listen, I get it. This team is the one you want to talk about, they are clearly the best team in the world-

Skylar Smith:
They're exciting.

Matt Ellentuck:
They are.

Skylar Smith:
They really are. Matt, how do you think the WNBA has been covered this season, and what was your experience covering the WNBA this season? As opposed to previous seasons where it's the normal setup

Matt Ellentuck:
Listen, honestly, I think WNBA PR did a really good job getting us pretty much everything we needed... what was possible. I should also preface with, I hate the fact that the WNBA didn't let any media, aside from Holly Rowe, into the bubble. That sucked. I think that was an issue throughout the entire season because, we weren't getting the full scope of what was going on at the very beginning, and I think that was some of the most important parts of this year is terms of, is everybody safe? How's everybody living? How is everybody being transported? What are the protocols? Which, by the way, we still don't know a lot of the protocols of what should have happened if somebody actually tested positive. So the important parts at the beginning were a mess, and if the WNBA is going to do another bubble like this in 2021, they need to let more media aside from just Holly in, because I had so much information coming in from other people in the bubble, or hearing things outside of the bubble, and it's like, what was true? And I didn't know how to compare anything because I'm not there, I'm not seeing it.

Matt Ellentuck:
But in terms of the actual PR staffs of each team, getting us in contact with players, and getting us in contact with coaches, and letting us know when practices were, and sending up email blasts of "Here's how you can get in touch with this person and this person." That part was great. Getting everybody [inaudible 00:09:02] game was easy. Even yesterday, we had two rounds of interviews with Sue Bird so tons of people got to talk to Sue right after the finals, which is key, because that's usually the access that you get in a locker room. You have the post-game media stand with everybody asking five or seven minutes worth of questions, but then the real reporting comes usually in the locker room.

Matt Ellentuck:
Being able to pull a player aside and get a one-on-one with them, or even just building the... I don't want to say a friendship, but a working relationship with these people, which we missed out on because we're not in the locker room every day, we don't get to introduce ourselves to new players or rookies and things like that. But I think PR really handled it well for us to get the information we needed at the end of the season. I still have a lot of questions if we're going to do this again though.

Skylar Smith:
Yeah. It's kind of the pros and cons of... Okay, you can't be there in person, and so you're not getting all that in-person stuff. But then also, because everything is virtual you can at the same time attend everything, for every team. Instead of, like in past years, you'd be stuck in one city or whatever.

Matt Ellentuck:
Exactly, which is a weird mix, because then you get a little bit of everything but you don't get in depth on one thing, so it was that sort of trade-off this year.

Skylar Smith:
Yeah, I definitely was thinking about the lack of media in the wubble last week with that Storm COVID scare. We just knew so little about it and everyone-

Matt Ellentuck:
That was a disaster.

Skylar Smith:
Yeah. Everyone knew so little about it. It's such a scary situation. It was tough to see the way that that was handled.

Matt Ellentuck:
I think players inside the bubble had the same feelings because, they also didn't know what was going on and, usually it's on us to pull apart at the league to get what's actually going on but we're not there, we can't really do anything.

Skylar Smith:
Right. Let's get into the series a little bit. Brian, I feel like we've been trying to hold you back for a while, and I feel like we just need to let you out at this point. Do you just want to give us one minute on your takeaways from this series, a very happy Storm [inaudible 00:11:16]

Brian Bosche:
Just the series individually?

Skylar Smith:
Yeah.

Brian Bosche:
I thought that obviously, loved seeing Sue Bird get another championship. Sounds like she might come back again next year, Matt I want some insider info on that if you can a little bit later. But it's really amazing to see Breanna Stewart step up, get the finals MVP again. Matt, loved the newsletter on every single Breanna Stewart accomplishment over the last eight years. I read that out loud in our last podcast because it is just unbelievable. And it's just really good to see this Storm team, which avoided a lot of the injuries of the other teams, avoided a lot of players pulling out this season, and really came together. Had so many weapons, had young players combined with the veterans, this was just such a fun WNBA team to watch and showed how good the WNBA can be. And I'm really happy to see them win it.

Brian Bosche:
It was kind of like this Lakers-Heat series where, it's sad to see Dearica Hamby out, who's a key player for the Aces obviously, two times Sixth Woman of the Year. Especially on defensive stopping, maybe putting up some fight against Breanna Stewart. It was just sad to see a Aces team that could have had Kelsey Plum, and Liz Cambage, and all their core role-players and star players not be in the series. I would have loved to see more of a titan vs titan matchup but, it was amazing to see the Storm uh step up and just take this, I thought all season.

Skylar Smith:
Yeah. Matt, what were some of your big takeaways from this series. I feel like we've got to even Brian out a little bit with the Storm.

Matt Ellentuck:
Listen, Seattle is the team who we thought they were, they also had the advantage of bringing everybody on the roster into the bubble, which is something I think only the Dallas Wings were also able to say that they could do. And then even throughout the playoffs, everybody stayed healthy minus Sami Whitcomb, who didn't play in the finals because of the birth of her kid. They had almost everybody also in the finals. That's not to say that I don't think even a healthy Aces team could have handled the Storm team, I think they are truly the best team. They've got... Breanna Stewart is probably the most dominant basketball player in the world, period. I think there's such a large separation between her and the second best WNBA player, that she's just really hard to stop and obviously even Sue at 39 is putting up [inaudible 00:13:46] performances.

Matt Ellentuck:
Jewell Loyd has also launched into a total superstar. I will say Las Vegas really surprised me this year. I did think that losing Kelsey Plum and Cambage would probably do them in a little bit earlier. I was super impressed by A'ja Wilson all year, true superstar. Has probably proven that she needs to be that player playing the five in the paint, which brings up a lot of questions about how this roster looks next year. Danielle Robinson really stepped up in the playoffs... If I'm an Aces fan I feel pretty good. You god to feel pretty good about what you saw going into the playoffs and into the finals, and knowing that pieces will be there next year depending on how you want to shape the roster.

Skylar Smith:
Yeah, for sure. I think that's what is so crazy about watching these two teams. This Aces team feels pretty young, they're just starting to really get into a groove together, really starting to play well together. The thing about Seattle is, they've been so dominant and I think people just think of Seattle as an older team because of Sue Bird. This Seattle team is really young and could be doing this for a while longer which is crazy.

Matt Ellentuck:
No. I hate to break it to people but, nope. This team's going to be doing this for a little bit.

Skylar Smith:
Yeah. We're truly just going to continue hearing about the Storm for years, and it feels like they've already been so dominant.

Matt Ellentuck:
You know what's crazy too? We obviously are going to have questions once Sue inevitably retires, when she's 78 or so, but they have Ezi Magbegor. I don't know how to put that into words but they have a 21 year old, going to be a perennial all-star. If you saw any glimpses of her this year, there's no one really built like her aside from Breanna Stewart. 6'4", seven foot plus wingspan, is going to be able to shoot the ball, can protect the rim, can dribble from the perimeter. She could not be a better compliment for Breanna Stewart going forward. This team is built so deep and their generational player is 26 years old, they're going to be doing this for a long-ass time.

Skylar Smith:
Yeah. Matt, Brian has claimed for years that Breanna Stewart is going to be the greatest women's basketball player of all time.

Brian Bosche:
I said basketball player.

Skylar Smith:
Do you think... okay basketball player [crosstalk 00:16:20]

Matt Ellentuck:
I might take that a notch up yeah.

Skylar Smith:
Okay, do you think Breanna Stewart is gonna be able to perform like this for the rest of her career? And is she going to be the greatest basketball player of all time?

Matt Ellentuck:
The rest of her career? I don't know. I think that's a little tough to say, but she did just recover from one of the worst injuries you can suffer as a basketball player, and still was very clearly the best player in the world so, I would say she's going to do this for a lot longer. Again, she's 26, probably just entering her basketball prime so... She's already got two WNBA championships, I mean Sue has asked about this yesterday... I think the most championships one player's won is five, will Stewart be able to get six? She's got two in four years so, yeah it's possible. I think that she definitely could go down as the best women's basketball player of all time, and if she continues at this rate, maybe the best basketball player.

Brian Bosche:
Yeah, I think it's about longevity with her. Sue Bird's playing until she's 39, DT has a really long career. It's almost like the Kareem Abdul-Jabbar comparison where he's playing for 20 years at a high level. She already I think is... Six championships in eight years, if you include Yukon. She's off to a hot start but she's got to keep her body in that type of shape so that she can last another 10 years, to get to that-

Matt Ellentuck:
That's what I was going to say too. Even if her WNBA career doesn't go as ridiculously well as we think it will, she already has four out of four college basketball championships in the bank which, literally no one else can say that they were the most outstanding player of the tournament in four years and won all four rings. She's got a lot of fucking rings that she can brag about [inaudible 00:18:28] the WNBA.

Brian Bosche:
Yeah, it's also been-

Skylar Smith:
It is kind of-

Brian Bosche:
Sorry Skylar, I was going to go on a quick tangent where, it's been fun to see a lot of the WNBA players do media on the side, get their voices elevated. We've talked to Ari about getting to know the personalities of the players is a great way to get into the WNBA. And Breanna Stewart's starting a podcast, Tea with A & Phee... I love the Storm but it would have been really fun to see the Lynx versus the Aces and have Tea with A & Phee face-off in the actual championship series, but it's fun to see them almost launching their own media companies and media properties. Is that different this year? I don't remember seeing that in past years where a lot of the players are stepping up to do their own thing professionally and set themselves up for a long career, outside of basketball.

Matt Ellentuck:
Yeah, I think that was obviously a big part of the bubble too. Everybody and their agents and their best friends got together is like "All right we're not going to have much media here and this is probably our time to do whatever the hell we want." And [inaudible 00:19:39] with A'ja Wilson and Napheesa Collier was a genius. I think we also forget sometimes how well-connected the best athletes in the world are. It wasn't really a hassle for A'ja and Phee to get Damian Lillard, or whoever the hell they really want on their pod. All of these players are very well-connected, they've been competing against each other, or been at the same camps with each other, or attended the same colleges together, or played in the same Olympics as each other. They're all pretty connected so if they wanted to build their own media enterprise it's not like they have to go the JJ Redick route, where you sign a deal with The Ringer and use that media string.

Matt Ellentuck:
They're their own people, with their own voices, with their own connections, with their own money and sway. So I think that was really important and that podcast really fun. Something we get in the WNBA that we don't get in every other league is, first of all, players who are willing to share info, because they're not covered enough, which is pretty obvious. So they're willing to say what's on their mind because they want to get things out, and that's how you get really honest production like that. We get fun sound bites, we get some beef. It's fun, I think it was very smart and I guarantee we're going to see something like that going forward, especially if there's another bubble season, I bet you a whole lot of other players are probably going to feed off those ideas.

Brian Bosche:
Yeah, absolutely.

Skylar Smith:
Yeah, for sure. Brian, I know you've been dying to ask Matt this question. Let's shift back a little bit. Do you want to ask the super ponytail question?

Brian Bosche:
Oh yes!

Matt Ellentuck:
What's the ponytail question?

Brian Bosche:
Should Sue Bird's ponytail have its own place in the hall of fame? Separate from Sue Bird, the person.

Matt Ellentuck:
Is this a debate? I thought that was-

Skylar Smith:
It's decided, yes.

Brian Bosche:
...get the bobble head pony going. It's already on the bobble head. They should have it swing, they should make a bobble with the actual ponytail swinging. Like a bobble pony.

Matt Ellentuck:
Honestly, listen. I think you should probably not publish that and take-

Brian Bosche:
And then take it? That's a good idea.

Skylar Smith:
We're going to cut that from this podcast.

Matt Ellentuck:
Listen, I'd buy it. I'd buy anything though, so really, I'm not the best person to market to. Listen, anything to get Sue even more recognition. I don't understand how to define this career. Obviously LeBron's career is nuts, right? He's in year 17, he's dominating, he's going to win another championship too. Add more years to that, and then you get this person who's still setting records in the WNBA finals with just no sign of decline. She had those freak bone bruises in her knee but besides that, legend.

Brian Bosche:
Legend.

Skylar Smith:
Honestly, in the longevity of Sue's career, I'm most impressed that her ponytail has held up this well for this long because, she pulls those boys tight. I remember being concerned for her hairline a long time ago and it's perfect still. That's what I'm most impressed about and I feel like if you put Sue Bird's ponytail in the hall of fame, you also have to put Diana Taurasi's bun in the hall of fame. Maybe we just-

Matt Ellentuck:
We need a hair section, I'm for it. I'm not here to limit-

Skylar Smith:
I was just going to say, maybe we're the people we hate right now, that we're talking about a hair section in the women's hall of fame. Let's move on so people don't get mad at us.

Brian Bosche:
Skylar wants to put LeBron's graybeard in the hall of fame so-

Skylar Smith:
I want him to stop dying his beard. I want him to just commit to the gray.

Matt Ellentuck:
I kind of also want bald LeBron but listen, we can have another hair pod.

Skylar Smith:
I want bald Caruso. He needs to give up on this fluff on top of his head.

Matt Ellentuck:
The good news is he's getting close.

Brian Bosche:
Yeah, he doesn't need any help there.

Skylar Smith:
Let's talk about the kind of set up of this WNBA playoffs a little bit. We've seen a lot of criticisms about the single elimination games, as well as the five game series, We were just talking about before we started the pod, how quickly this wubble situation went by, especially the playoffs. I felt like the playoffs just flew by. I want to hear from both of you what do you think of these single elimination games and what do you think of the five game series. Are they long enough? Are they giving us a good enough picture of who the better team is? Is the better team always getting through? And should they move towards the longer series? Brian, let's start with you.

Brian Bosche:
I thought the single elimination games were exciting, and it was kind of fun to have that opportunity. But I think Sue Bird talked about this too where, at least for the second round, I would have loved to see a little bit longer of a series instead of two back-to-back single elimination games. And I think that it was a short season, but it takes away from what you do during the entire season... not to take away from the Sun's run... The Connecticut Sun but, getting through both of those rounds with a losing record, and it was an incredible run, but the other teams are looking at that maybe going "Well, we put this work in during the season to just be eliminated in one game." I think that's a tough pill to swallow. What do you think Matt?

Matt Ellentuck:
Yeah, I remember I talked to players right after the W started this new format, three or four years ago. They obviously weren't happy with the idea of single eliminations because of what you said before, playing a whole year to get knocked out in 40 minutes absolutely sucks. But I think it rules. I understand their frustrations but we also... Listen, we have a league with 12 teams and two-thirds of the league makes the playoffs, so we need to give some incentive to the top seeds for being the top seeds. I think I'm cool with the first round being a knockout punch.

Matt Ellentuck:
I think maybe the second round should be a little longer. Maybe we give a three game series to the second round, only because then we have seasons like the Sparks, who are the three seed and they get knocked out in 40 minutes. I think that sucks. Being the three seed is still pretty damn good, so we should probably also give them a little more of an incentive than a seven or eight seed aside from just not having to play in two single elimination games and still having to play one. In terms of the finals, I like a five game series. I wouldn't hate a seven game series but even in the NBA finals right now, I don't want basketball to be over but I know how this is going to end. I'm going to still watch the game but I know how this is going to end, we knew how the Storm series was going to end after game two. I'm okay with five game series in the finals.

Skylar Smith:
Yeah I'm a Pistons fan but I've adopted the Heat during this bubble and, I thought that this finals was going to be a lot more fun. I'm in the same boat as you, it's not that fun right now guys. Not that I want basketball to be over but I'm not having fun right now. I kind of thought the same as you with the single elimination games, I don't know that it's the best format, I don't know that we're always getting the better team out of it but, god damn they're fun to watch. As a viewer I'm not mad at it.

Matt Ellentuck:
And I think that's kind of important-

Skylar Smith:
Brian do you want to? ...

Matt Ellentuck:
Go ahead.

Skylar Smith:
No you can go.

Matt Ellentuck:
I was going to say, I think that's part of what's important, right? We're putting on an entertainment product and does anyone want to watch a seven game series? Most of those first round NBA series, they suck. We know how 1-8 and 2-7, and most of the time 3-6... We know how they're going to go. For the WNBA I think that's important, we're trying to grow a bigger audience here, we're trying to get more people to pay attention and are they more likely to watch a three or five game series between two teams that it's probably going to be a blowout, or if not, it's just not going to be as interesting because you don't have as many good players? Or do you want to give everybody that NCAA tournament feel in the opening rounds? I think that's really important and that's how we get Shey Peddy buzzer-beaters and that's part of the importance of creating moments. Any way the WNBA can create a moment to capture an audience, to capture the highlight of the night, to capture a fan's interest. That's super important so I love it for the first round, it makes it so much more fun.

Skylar Smith:
Yeah. Brian, how did you feel about the Storm's celebration last night? I think we got some really iconic moments out of it. Matt, I don't know if you were in that media scrum with Breanna Stewart, with the goggles, and chugging wine or champagne, I don't know which.

Brian Bosche:
Yeah I want to kick it to Matt then. Matt what was it like being there? As there as we can possibly be during a pandemic.

Matt Ellentuck:
I know. I live in DC, I covered the W nationally but I was based here so I was around the Mystics a ton, and I was here when they won their championship last year, to witness the chaos in person right in front of my face... Aerial Powers taking out bottles of, I don't even remember what she had, out of her bag and passing around the locker room, the good old days of being able to see humans and share drinks. Obviously that that was so much fun and and watching them all get completely tanked and have to go on stage and pretend to form coherent sentences... so we didn't get that exact same feel virtually, obviously. I think it was also weird for the players who at that point had a little bit to drink and they're staring at a computer screen pretending to talk to fake voices.

Matt Ellentuck:
I think they made the most of it. Listen, right after the game, the confetti celebration was obviously nice considering in the rounds before, we didn't even see hats and shirts for players, which they were rightfully pissed about. I don't understand how you can't get shirts inside the bubble, it's not that hard, you click order. It looks like they had fun. I mean, Stewie was talking about how much alcohol they had back in the locker room. She came out in goggles that she refused to take off, chugging a bottle of champagne. She basically sat down at first she was like "This is how it's going to be, if you think I'm taking these off you're wrong, this is my moment." She was a ton of fun and then obviously Sue came out super professional. And then in the middle of it as questions are dragging on... Because it's so weird, right?

Matt Ellentuck:
As a media person you're like "All right, I've got questions to ask but clearly this person doesn't give a crap about what I have to say right now, they just want [inaudible 00:31:12] they want to do anything but talk to me." And rightfully so. I don't want to talk to me on a normal day. In the middle of Sue's conference, Stewie just comes in and starts throwing confetti at her, and they're spraying her with whatever champagne bottles. Stewie's even talking to Haley, the Storm's PR person, she's like "No more questions Haley, get her out of here." It was a lot of fun, I'm glad that they were able to have that moment and they're about to welcome back to reality. I don't know if they're flying out today or tomorrow but they're going to get their welcome back to not being able to be in a crowd of people, throwing champagne and... They're living in a fake world currently. Listen, I'm glad they had that moment, it wasn't the same obviously because we're not there in person but, for them, I'm sure it was better, they had to deal with us a lot less.

Skylar Smith:
I hadn't even thought about them getting sling-shotted back into reality and how... they're so used to being able to hug each other and... That's got to be so weird, I hadn't even thought about that.

Matt Ellentuck:
That's the end of that. I think even Kurt Miller tweeted about it the other day, and he was just like "I haven't looked at a TV in four months." They've just been living in this 24 hour, we only think about basketball environment, where they can do normal things and that's unfortunately not how the rest of this world is operating.

Brian Bosche:
Yeah. I thought it was really funny how Breanna Stewart and her acceptance speech for the NBA finals MVP was very stoic. She was a little bit like "I'm going to be professional, I'm going to do this..." And then just immediate turn around, goggles champagne to the dome, doing a press conference drunk I was like "Yes, I like both sides." You get both sides of it.

Matt Ellentuck:
That's what I want to see too. I remember I got yelled at last year because I was somewhere where I wasn't supposed to be. I was literally walking around with my camera I was like [inaudible 00:33:11] chug that beer, chug it. I've got my phone right here, I want to see Elena Delle Donne chug. She didn't. And then I was kindly escorted outside of the family area.

Brian Bosche:
That's journalism right there, that's what the people want to see.

Matt Ellentuck:
Which is some true-ass journalism, she did not chug unfortunately. Aerial Powers did enough of that. I love it, have fun, this is it, this is your moment. They went through like a really shitty few months. I think everybody was tired of the bubble, obviously and they missed a lot of things on the outside, and with friends, and family, and whatever health things, or weddings or just life events and stuff. It was all in pursuit to entertain us. So, go off Breanna Stewart, get drunk.

Skylar Smith:
Go off Colleen. Let's wrap this wubble, this WNBA season, it's over. Let's do some final thoughts on it. Brian, I'm going to throw it over to you. What was your favorite moment of this wubble?

Brian Bosche:
Are we doing favorite moment, MVP, are we doing a list?

Skylar Smith:
Yeah, we'll do full thoughts, favorite moment, MVP...

Brian Bosche:
I'll share. My takeaway from the wubble, which I want your feedback too on Matt, is, I loved that the WNBA and NBA were playing at the same time. And they both had the wubble bubble experiences. I thought the cross-promotion between the games, between the playoffs was really powerful and I think it helped bring more people into the WNBA audience, you love to see the NBA players rocking the WNBA sweatshirts that you have on now, and the GOAT DT shirt. I thought that really helped bring visibility into it, so I thought there were a lot of things that the WNBA can learn from the wubble, that will help them grow the league in future seasons that might not be in a wubble. My biggest takeaway was, loved that the players started their own media companies basically, had their own podcast, we got to hear more of their voices. And that they were during the NBA season to bring more into it. And I love that the Storm won. That's my biggest takeaway, is the Seattle Storm champions.

Skylar Smith:
Yeah, that's fair. When I was watching the final game last night, I loved that... We're so used to the WNBA being second billing behind the NBA, I was watching this game and obviously the Lakers-Heat were playing right after and, during the Storm-Aces game they were like "All right, don't forget there's more basketball tonight." "Guys make sure you don't turn off the TV, there's more coming." It's funny that they phrased it that... "Don't forget we got LeBron tonight." It was so funny. We never hear it like that, I thought it was amazing. Matt what do you think? Do you think that the WNBA benefits from playing at the same time as the NBA?

Matt Ellentuck:
I don't know. I think it might have been fun for some fans, but then we're obviously missing a lot. Because people are still going to prioritize, if they're NBA fans, watching the NBA over the WNBA. I think it is kind of important that these seasons don't overlap because this is your basketball, if you're a basketball fan, you're watching the WNBA because it's this or nothing. Otherwise you're not really a basketball fan. When you have two seasons going on at once you miss that. You also miss the media aspect, that's the thing I've talked to a lot of people about. A lot of people who were just starting to get into the W last year were like "Man, I wish I was able to watch more this year, I just got into it last year but with the overlap I'm only..." That's not their job, so I think we miss a little bit of that.

Matt Ellentuck:
Personally, I love the finals aligning. I know that there's no way to do that in the future. I love the finals setup, having one like parlay into the other was beautiful, and I know a lot of friends were reaching out because they were watching the third or fourth quarter of the WNBA finals, because they were just prepping for the NBA finals and that brought together new fans too. So there were some pluses from it. I'm a little concerned if this is going to be the format going forward, especially since the NBA is talking about adjusting the season further back, and if they want to start it in January they would end at the end of the Summer during the WNBA season too so I don't know how it looks. Obviously we don't even know if we're going to do bubble scenarios anymore. If we are doing one, it'd be awesome if we can get everybody in the same bubble. I don't know, there's a lot on the table so I think there were some pluses but for the long haul, I don't think it's great to have both seasons going on at once.

Skylar Smith:
Yeah, it is kind of crazy. It's nice to have the cross-promotion between the two leagues but, this is literally the time in all of the viewers' lives where we all have the most amount of time to be watching basketball. If we were all going to our jobs every day, seeing our friends, doing normal things not in a pandemic, we would have way less time to be watching basketball and I, like you said, I was already struggling to watch all the basketball that was on because it was literally so much. This feels like such a unique pandemic thing, but at the same time it does feel like there's maybe some lessons that the WNBA could take from this wubble experience to adopt in the future. Brian, was there anything that you actually really loved about this bubble season that you would love to see implemented in future seasons?

Brian Bosche:
I think having the teams together, I thought was interesting as a takeaway, especially in the playoffs. Maybe if the playoffs are in a bubble, especially during the pandemic that would be interesting. Because we were just talking about if people like Matt have access to all teams at once throughout the playoffs, I think that can be pretty powerful. I know it's hard because you need revenue from the games in-stadium, KeyArena here just got renovated. They're going to have Storm games here if they're able to, with fans in the audience. But I thought it was interesting, the concept of bringing players together all at once and seeing what happens, because the wubble moments were some of my favorites, and just having those serendipitous interactions between players, and teams, and the beach days...I thought that was really interesting.

Brian Bosche:
I would say the biggest takeaway is, empower the athletes. It's a personality driven league. I think we saw that here, the storylines were from the players. I've mentioned the podcast they've started a few times, but really elevating the different players and the different story lines throughout and show how the WNBA is really a leading organization, not even in basketball but just in social issues and justice in general and how they are messaging to the world. So I think it's empower the voices is the biggest takeaway here, and then empower the journalists and the creators who are trying to cover it and give them that access because I thought they did a pretty good job, but I think that they've excluded some people and there have been some moments that could have been amplified better and given better access across all different types of creators and journalists so, empower these personalities, empower these players, and empower the people covering them to do their jobs.

Skylar Smith:
For sure. And then, finally, last question on this entire WNBA season. We've talked a lot about the differences between the wubble off the court mostly, in coverage, in player experience, in viewer experience. Did we really see big differences in the play in the wubble versus a normal WNBA season? I know Brian and I talked a lot about all of the different injuries happening towards the beginning of the season, because there were just so many games, they didn't have a ton of warm-up time. Did we see big differences in wubble play? Matt, what do you think?

Matt Ellentuck:
I think everybody was exhausted. Mentally, physically, just really tired. That's also a concern going forward. how do we recreate this again but make sure that we're not putting players in a position where they're going to get banged up, and they're going to maybe even start to like resent some aspects to the bubble, because it's too much. They were playing three or four games in a week, which is you know crazy on its own and I know that they weren't traveling but a lot of these players lost a ton of usual conditioning from the start of the season. NBA guys, not all of them, but a lot of them have the luxury of having their own private gyms, either at home, or just a place to access even during the pandemic where they were able to go in and out of. The WNBA players don't have that same money and influence so a lot of them were left stranded. We even saw during that horse competition, Allie Quigley and Courtney Vandersloot, literally a powerhouse basketball couple, didn't have a basketball hoop at home because they're used to going to different places, and they had to buy one to put on their cobblestone garage. It wasn't the greatest setup for them and they're two of the best in the world so a lot of players didn't get the right conditioning. I think every single coach in the league had complained about the lack of time for preparation because, if you're trying to incorporate new rookies, new signees, new off-season acquisitions all at once in a three-week time period where they were also isolated at some points, and they had to test every day, and you couldn't get everybody in the court at a certain time... It was disastrous to start off. I'm not really blaming the W for this, they were put in a crazy circumstance so I totally get why things were the way they were, but they're going to have to figure out how to do that better next year because I think everybody got banged up. We saw a ton of ankle turns which sucks, but also probably a consequence of a lack of prep and a lot of play. They're going to have to figure that part out. Obviously by the finals... Seattle was smart. Any time Sue got banged up they were like "sit your ass on that bench we'll see you in October." And even though Stewie in the last two games of the regular season was the same thing. "We don't need that one seed so, Stewie we're going to rest you, we need you to drop 37 in a couple weeks." So same thing, they're going to figure out that balance, which is also really hard. It's not a thing I'm saying that could be an easy fixed, because you have players coming from overseas and they're arriving at different times, they've got to leave at different times. The W has this tight gap, and it's going to be even tighter next year if we have the Olympics. It's going to be hard, I am glad I'm not on that team to figure that out because that sounds like hell.

Skylar Smith:
Same. Brian, any final thoughts?

Brian Bosche:
No.

Matt Ellentuck:
It ended how we wanted.

Skylar Smith:
Thank you so much for being here. That was exactly what I wanted. This has been so fun Matt. Tell the people where you can find you.

Matt Ellentuck:
[crosstalk 00:44:55] To be clear, I don't want to find you guys.

Skylar Smith:
He is not trying to find you.

Matt Ellentuck:
I promise, no restraining order-

Brian Bosche:
We're bad at plugs, it's all right.

Skylar Smith:
What's your twitter at? Where can they find your newsletter?

Matt Ellentuck:
I'm tired, we're all tired. My twitter is m Ellentuck, my last name, which is spelled exactly how you think. E-L-L-E-N-T-U-C-K. You can find my writing at that same name m Ellentuck dot substack dot com.

Skylar Smith:
Nice, we will see you guys back here on Sunday, for our Sunday roast. Hopefully with not an NBA championship yet.

Brian Bosche:
Bye Matt.

Matt Ellentuck:
Take care guys.

Skylar Smith:
Bye.