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      Sue Bird Became the Legend She Needed: ‘There Was No Real Path’

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      Sue Bird peeked upcourt as she caught the outlet pass. Her Seattle Storm teammate Natasha Howard had streaked ahead of her like a wide receiver, as she usually did whenever Bird was running the offense in transition. Howard realized that she was open beneath the basket and braced herself. Bird, she knew, would find her like always. She just didn’t know how.Bird slithered into the lane, drawing a defender. Then, without looking, she whipped the ball over her head and into Howard’s awaiting palms.“My hands were always ready for Sue when she passed me the ball,” said Howard, now with the Liberty. She added: “That right there, it’s like: ‘Wow, OK, Sue. You got eyes behind your head.’”Bird counts the pass among her favorite assists in her 19 seasons with the Storm. She has plenty of passes to choose from: Bird is the W.N.B.A.’s career leader in assists.“I have a little bit of a Rain Man brain so hold on a second,” she had said as she tried to pick her favorite assist. After a second, she cited the no-look pass to Howard, in 2018, and a between-the-legs pass to a trailing Lauren Jackson in the 2003 All-Star Game. She wasn’t finished.“Oh, there’s also another one to Lauren,” Bird said. “It was in the playoffs against Minnesota. I think it was like 2012 and we were down 3. We needed a 3, and it wasn’t a fancy assist by any means, but we ran a play to perfection. I hit Lauren. She hits the shot.”Those are the kinds of assists that Bird built her reputation on. “The timing around a great pass is so the person you’re passing to doesn’t have to change anything that they’re doing,” Bird said.At 41 years old, Bird is within weeks of the end of her W.N.B.A. career. In June, she announced that she would retire at the end of the season, though most people had expected as much. At the end of the 2021 season, fans chanted “one more year!” at an emotional Bird and kept up the campaign with hashtags on social media for months through the off-season. In January, Bird nodded to the campaign in an Instagram post and wrote “OK.”Her résumé had room for one more season, but just barely. She is a 13-time All-Star and has won four championships. She toppled Ticha Penicheiro’s career assist record of 2,599 five years ago and now has 3,222 regular-season assists in a league-record 578 games.As the assists have piled up, Bird has evolved as a passer.“Every now and then, it can be fancy,” Bird said. “Every now and then, you do have to look the defense off, but for me, it’s just always about trying to read the defense and be one step ahead, so you can find that person.Bird broke the career assists record against the Washington Mystics in 2017. Ned Dishman/NBAE via Getty Images“As I’ve gotten older, I’ve definitely used the no-look more, and when I do a no-look nowadays, I’m not trying to look like Magic Johnson did or something like that. I’m really just trying to look off the defense. I’m just trying to get them to think my eyes are looking somewhere else, so that I can make the play.”No other player is as synced with the league’s infancy and growth, its history and present, as Bird, the consummate floor general who excelled through consistency by delivering the ball to the right person at the right time in the right spot, year after year, decade after decade.“She is the W.N.B.A,” said Crystal Langhorne, who converted 161 of Bird’s passes into buckets, the fourth-most of any teammate behind Jackson (624), Breanna Stewart (345) and Jewell Loyd (217), according to the Elias Sports Bureau. “It’s going to be crazy with a league where she’s not there anymore. Sue is the prototype.”Hearing those types of compliments has been one of the pleasant and unexpected byproducts of announcing her retirement, Bird said.“You just always knew what to expect from me,” Bird said. “Everyone knew if they turned on a Storm game, what they were going to see. So, it’s kind of hard to imagine it not being there, because it’s been there for 20 years.”Bird entered the W.N.B.A. in its sixth season as the top overall pick in the 2002 draft, carrying heavy expectations into Seattle after two N.C.A.A. women’s basketball championships at Connecticut.She made her first pro assist to Adia Barnes, now the women’s basketball coach at Arizona. Barnes, 45, last played professionally 12 years ago and spent several years as a broadcaster before coaching, all while Bird continued stacking one assist after another.“I totally forgot that,” Barnes said of Bird’s first assist, laughing. “I made the shot, so that was a good thing. I don’t remember it, but you can act like I do. Make it sound good, please.”From the left: Bird, Lauren Jackson, Adia Barnes and Betty Lennox in 2004 at a game against the Charlotte Sting. Bird made her first pro assist to Barnes.Jeff Reinking/NBAE via Getty ImagesBarnes does recall Bird’s steadiness from the beginning. The pair often roomed on the road.“She was just a true point guard, and I think what separated Sue is, she’s a connector, so you wanted to play with her.”Barnes won a championship in 2004 with Bird and Jackson, who became a dynamic pick-and-roll pairing, and Bird and Jackson won another in 2010. They left defenses helpless. If a defender ducked under a Jackson screen, Bird could bury a 3. If they doubled Bird, Jackson could drive to the rim or pop out for an open jumper. The ball typically arrived on time.“There was really no way to help it,” Barnes said. “It was just very, very, very hard to guard and they made it look seamless.”Bird said her awareness of angles and spacing was always on, even when walking through a mall.“You’re always moving in a way, seeing things in way that is similar to being on the court,” Bird said. “Obviously, you’re not in a game, so you’re not having to move fast or do things with urgency, but I think you just always move that way when you have that type of vision. That sounds insane. It’s actually not.”Teammates would spot Bird carrying binders and notebooks to study the game. “You don’t really need to ask how she does it,” Howard said. “She just does it.”Receiving a pass from Bird inspired confidence, Langhorne said. Here was one of the game’s greats, entrusting her with the ball and to make the right play.“Even when I was working on my 3s and I wasn’t as confident, if I knew Sue kicked it back to me, I was like: ‘Oh, yeah, shoot it. She’s giving it to you for a reason,’” Langhorne said. “Which I never even really said out loud before.”Injuries forced Jackson to leave the W.N.B.A. in 2012. Bird found her next post partner in Stewart, another Connecticut product who Seattle took with the first overall pick in 2016. The two won championships in 2018 and 2020.Bird won her fourth championship alongside Breanna Stewart, left, in 2020.Octavio Jones for The New York Times“She knows where everyone is supposed to be before sometimes we even do,” Stewart said. “She knows which block I would prefer to get the ball on or which pass is going to get through and which isn’t. Sometimes, when you’re on the basketball court, a player makes a cut and then the pass comes, and sometimes with Sue, the pass comes and then the player makes the cut because she’s seeing the defense sometimes quicker than us.”Bird said Penicheiro, who retired in 2012, and the Chicago Sky’s Courtney Vandersloot are among the point guards she has most enjoyed watching because “they’re really fun.” Vandersloot recently passed Lindsay Whalen to become third on the W.N.B.A.’s career assists list. She’s the active player closest to tying Bird — and she’s still more than 800 assists away.Bird broke Penicheiro’s record with her 2,600th assist to a cutting Carolyn Swords in 2017.“It was actually a pretty nice pass, and she deserves it. And records are meant to be broken, and if anybody breaks your record, you want it to be a player like Sue Bird,” Penicheiro said.“Everybody loves Sue,” she added. “If she was an ass, it’d be easier to go against her and try to stick it to her, but she’s too nice and I am, too.”Even one assist from Bird is a moment to remember. Thirteen players received one assist from Bird, according to Elias. The list includes Courtney Paris, who regarded Bird as one of her favorite players growing up and spent most of her W.N.B.A. career on alert as an opponent who had the unenviable task of trying to play team defense against her.“The second you go to help, she’s going to find the smallest piece of space to get the ball to whoever needs to get it,” Paris said.Bird said she accomplished everything she wanted to in the league.A.J. Olmscheid/Associated PressParis joined the Storm in 2018 and did not play often in her two seasons in Seattle as her playing career wound down. Paris did not remember the type of pass she received from Bird or how she scored, but she recalled being excited over the sequence.“It was a full circle moment from watching her when I was a younger player,” Paris said.Ashley Walker, another member of the one-assist from Bird club, who played with Seattle in 2009, was similarly appreciative.“She’s one of the pioneers,” Walker said. “She’s someone that people look up to, and she did it with such grace, such confidence. And it’s just amazing to know that I’m a part of that experience and I actually get a chance to say: ‘I caught a pass from Sue Bird. What did you do?’”Bird has also made her mark during the postseason with her assists. She set a playoff record with 14 assists in a 2004 Western Conference finals game against Sacramento, then broke it with 16 in Game 1 of the 2020 finals against Las Vegas. Vandersloot broke that postseason record last year, with 18 assists against Connecticut.The chapter is closing on one of the W.N.B.A.’s most memorable careers. Bird said she accomplished everything she wanted to in the league, establishing goals in the moment.“The easy analogy here is, who does everybody chase in the N.B.A.? Michael Jordan,” Bird said. “Because Michael Jordan played a full career. He won six rings. So, six rings became the standard. In our league, when I got into the league, that didn’t really exist.”She continued: “There was no real path to follow, because nobody had that 20-year career yet. So, I really didn’t know what to dream, and so to sit here now with all the championships I have, I just feel really satisfied.”Now a young player — Bird named Arike Ogunbowale of the Dallas Wings as an example — can model the milestones in the careers of players such as Maya Moore and Diana Taurasi.Many, of course, will look at Bird’s illustrious career.“I think there is something that motivates you in that way, but at the same time, forging your own path, I enjoyed that as well,” Bird said. “I’m not sure. Maybe having something to chase is better. Maybe there’s more pressure.”Lindsey Wasson for The New York Times More

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      Nets Owner Backs Team Leaders Amid Durant’s Reported Ultimatum

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      “Our front office and coaching staff have my support,” Joe Tsai said on Twitter just hours after a report that Kevin Durant wants the team to choose between keeping him or the coach and G.M.Joe Tsai, the owner of the Nets, issued a statement of support for the team’s front office and coaching staff on Twitter Monday evening and added, “We will make decisions in the best interest of the Brooklyn Nets.”Our front office and coaching staff have my support. We will make decisions in the best interest of the Brooklyn Nets.— Joe Tsai (@joetsai1999) August 8, 2022
      The tweet appeared to be in response to a report from The Athletic that said the team’s star forward, Kevin Durant, was still insistent that the Nets meet a trade demand he made in June. Durant, one of the N.B.A.’s best players, met with Tsai in person over the weekend, The Athletic reported, and conditioned his staying with the team on the removal of Coach Steve Nash and General Manager Sean Marks. (Durant previously had publicly lauded Nash, who just completed his second year as the Nets’ coach, saying in the spring that the coach had handled the Nets “perfectly.”)The Nets did not respond to a request for comment, and a spokesman for Durant’s company, Boardroom, declined to comment.Tsai’s Twitter post was an unusual escalation of a simmering feud between Durant, 33, and the Nets. Tsai has rarely weighed in on basketball matters publicly, and just one year ago Durant appeared to be happily married to the Nets, having agreed to a four-year contract extension with the team he had signed with in the summer of 2019.But much of Durant’s three seasons with the Nets haven’t gone according to plan and have been marked by tumult.Durant, while recovering from an Achilles’ tendon injury, signed with the franchise along with his friends, the star point guard Kyrie Irving and the veteran center DeAndre Jordan. During the 2020-21 season, the Nets traded many of their young players, along with several draft picks, to Houston for James Harden, seemingly assembling one of the most fearsome star groups in N.B.A. history.But injuries kept the three stars from seeing the court very often. They played only 16 games together and had a dominant record of 13-3. In the 2021 playoffs, the Nets lost in the second round to the Milwaukee Bucks, the eventual champions.Last season, the Nets were once again optimistic that they would live up to their lofty expectations. But Irving’s refusal to get vaccinated against Covid-19 meant that he couldn’t play in home games until later in the season because of a New York City rule that was eventually lifted. A frustrated Harden asked the Nets for a trade, and the Nets sent him to the division rival Philadelphia 76ers for Ben Simmons. And once again, Durant, as well as other players on the team, dealt with injuries, forcing Nash to push rookies into unexpected roles.Durant, left, requested a trade in June after having signed a four-year extension with the Nets in 2021.Brad Penner/USA Today Sports, via ReutersThe Nets hit rock bottom in the playoffs, where they were swept in the first round by the Boston Celtics, an embarrassing outcome for a team that looked to be — on paper — one of the most talented teams of the decade.Durant’s trade request was a bombshell that shocked many league observers. For one thing, the Nets were projected to enter training camp with a formidable roster that include Simmons, a three-time All-Star, and Irving, who opted into the final year of his contract. But a player of Durant’s caliber has almost never made a trade request like this with four years left on his contract.Durant’s trade value, despite his résumé, is uncertain, in part because of how rare his request is and also because of Durant himself. In three years with the Nets, he played 90 regular season games of a possible 236 because of injuries. He will be entering his 16th season, a stage by which most players are already in steep decline. But when Durant has played, he has mostly looked like he always has: a generational talent.Durant’s talent makes him a tantalizing risk for a team looking to put itself over the top, not the least of which is that when a team trades for him, he might not want to stay. More

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      A Chaotic Sprint to the Finish for the W.N.B.A. Season

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      Six teams are fighting for the final three playoff spots with only one week left.The Chicago Sky, the reigning champions, are assured of one of the top two spots in the upcoming W.N.B.A. playoffs. The rebuilding Indiana Fever are the only team out of contention. Everything else is up for grabs.The final week of the W.N.B.A.’s regular season should be a showcase of the parity and chaos the league has seen all season. Six of the league’s 12 teams are battling for the final three playoff spots, and the teams that have already clinched are still jockeying for seeding.At the top of the standings, the Sky are 25-8 and hold a two-game lead in the race for the No. 1 seed. Chicago can fall no further than a No. 2 seed after a win Sunday over the Connecticut Sun, but it will still need to hold off the Las Vegas Aces, who spoiled Sue Bird’s final regular-season game at Climate Pledge Arena with a win over the Seattle Storm. Chicago and Las Vegas face off Thursday in their final regular-season meeting.The Sun are solidly in the third spot but could still overtake the Aces for the No. 2 seed. A bigger battle is brewing below them, though, as Seattle and the Washington Mystics fight for home-court advantage in what is nearly certain to be the playoff matchup between the No. 4 and No. 5 seeds. The Storm are at a scheduling disadvantage, with games on the road against Chicago and Las Vegas around a trip to Minneapolis. The Mystics, meanwhile, finish with two games against the last-place Fever and play their final regular-season game at home.The Chicago Sky have clinched one of the top two spots in the playoffs.Michael Reaves/Getty ImagesOf the teams hoping to clinch one of the final playoff spots, the Dallas Wings were in the best shape entering Monday, holding a 16-16 record with four games remaining — all against teams that sit below them in the standings. Marina Mabrey’s 31 points helped Dallas clinch a berth with an 86-77 win Monday night against the Liberty.Below the Wings, though, the race is wide open. With three games left for each, the Atlanta Dream and Phoenix Mercury are tied at 14-19, though the Dream own the head-to-head tiebreaker. The Liberty are now 13-20 with three games left, and the Minnesota Lynx and Los Angeles Sparks are also hanging on at 13-20.The Dream, the Mercury and the Liberty have all been without key players down the stretch. Atlanta guard Tiffany Hayes has missed three games with an ankle injury, while Phoenix announced Monday that Diana Taurasi would miss the rest of the regular season with a quad injury. For Saturday’s game with Phoenix, the Liberty had finally gotten healthy as Betnijah Laney returned to action two months after knee surgery, but forward Natasha Howard went down with an ankle injury.Those injuries could leave the door open for the ninth-place Lynx: They hold the season tiebreakers over Phoenix and the Liberty, and they play the Mercury in a must-win game Wednesday. But the rest of Minnesota’s schedule is daunting, with games at home against Seattle and on the road against Connecticut. In its favor is the comeback of Napheesa Collier, who returned Sunday less than three months after giving birth. (A motivating factor for her was the chance to play again with Sylvia Fowles, who is retiring at the end of the season.)Finally, the Sparks may face the most difficult path to a playoff berth, for reasons on and off the court. Los Angeles had been in position for the No. 6 seed after a July 21 win over the Dream. But with drama swirling as the four-time All-Star Liz Cambage left the team, the Sparks dropped six games in a row to fall to 11th place.A win Sunday against the Mystics kept their hopes alive. But they must play back-to-back games this week against the third-place Sun before finishing up against the surging Wings. And making matters worse, the Sparks were caught up in a travel nightmare while trying to leave Washington.Dallas Wings guard Arike Ogunbowale going against Natasha Cloud of the Washington Mystics.Rebecca Slezak/The Dallas Morning News, via Associated PressAfter their flight was delayed and then canceled, some members of the Sparks spent the night in the airport when there weren’t enough hotel rooms for all players. Nneka Ogwumike, a former league M.V.P., said in a video posted on Twitter, “It’s the first time in my 11 seasons that I’ve ever had to sleep in the airport.” More

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      Sylvia Fowles Is as Dominant as Sue Bird. Why Isn’t She Better Known?

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      Sylvia Fowles has been as dominant on the court as Sue Bird, but only one of them is a household name, our columnist writes.Sylvia Fowles is one of the most successful American athletes ever.Four Olympic gold medals with the U.S. national women’s basketball team. Two W.N.B.A. titles with the Minnesota Lynx.Eight W.N.B.A. All-Star teams. One league Most Valuable Player Award. She is the league’s greatest rebounder and its career leader in field-goal percentage.Fowles won big in college at Louisiana State. In Europe. In Russia. In China.How much of the above did you know before reading this, especially those of you who don’t pay great attention to women’s basketball? Most likely not much, and that’s a shame because you’ve missed out on greatness.How good is Fowles?“The best-all-time classic center in the history of our league,” said Cheryl Reeve, who has coached Fowles since 2015 with the Lynx and the Olympic team.“Better than 99 percent of players that have ever played,” said Maya Moore, who competed with and against Fowles for years. Moore recalled Fowles’s mix of graceful power and emotional intelligence and the warm vibe she is known for: “Syl is the embodiment of a perfect teammate.”Before the current season, Fowles, 36, announced that she planned to retire, her remarkably strong, lithe frame having taken a ferocious pounding over a lifetime of achievement. Unless there is a drastic shake-up in the playoff picture, next Sunday’s game, when Minnesota visits the Connecticut Sun, will most likely be the last of her decorated 15-year W.N.B.A. career.Fowles is not the only W.N.B.A. all-timer set to end her playing days when the curtains close this season. After 21 years as the point guard for the Seattle Storm, Sue Bird will be gone, too.Even if you’re a casual sports fan who does not follow the women’s game, it’s a good bet you know Bird. She came to the league out of the University of Connecticut as the girl next door who could hoop with the best and exits it as much a household name as the W.N.B.A. has had.Fowles is just as good a player. Better, say many experts. Yet outside the respect earned from her peers and followers of women’s basketball, she has operated in the shadows.Fowles told me last week that she had to learn not to let the lack of fame bother her. “I have had to get to that space of not caring,” she said, noting it took about half of her career to come to terms with being as overlooked as a player of her caliber can be.Fowles said she has never been featured on national magazine covers or been the focus of ad campaigns from large-scale companies. She can walk through major airports unrecognized, other than the gawking looks from strangers marveling at a stunning, 6-foot-6 woman strolling through the concourse.“It has been frustrating to do everything right and be so consistent throughout the years and not get the credit,” Fowles said. “But at some point, you also have to let it go because if I held on to it, I would walk around being angry.”Bird and Fowles are peers in every meaningful sense of the word. They are basketball greats whose careers primarily overlapped. They became friends while playing together in Russia during Fowles’s early years as a professional player and have remained so.Fowles and Bird hugged before their teams played Wednesday. The two became friends early in their careers playing in a Russian basketball league.Steph Chambers/Getty ImagesBut there is a yawning gap between their sponsorship deals, popularity, name recognition and even their post-career broadcast opportunities. This is partly a function of typical sports dynamics. Point guards get more publicity than low-post players. Bird is comfortable in front of the camera. Fowles is low-key.The gap also exists because of societal disparities magnified in sports, where only a small number of women catch the spotlight. When I spoke with Bird, she did not hesitate to enumerate them.Bird is an out, proud lesbian, but she recognized that, to some, “I pass as a straight woman.” She continued, noting that she is also white, “small and, therefore, not intimidating, compared to Syl, who is Black, dark-skinned and of a certain stature, yeah, that is 100 percent at play here.”Fowles acknowledged as much, but didn’t seem in the mood to dissect it.“You think you’re supposed to do everything right, and then when you do everything right, that you’ll get noticed,” she said. “But for multiple reasons, that’s not the case.”Fowles’s voice trailed.“Why do I have to work twice as hard just to get noticed?”She wished for a better future: that the next generations of greats who look like her will be far better known, that the W.N.B.A. will find a way to promote all of its players. “Eighty percent of us are Black women, and you have to figure out how to market those Black women,” she said. “I don’t think we do that quite well.”Fowles has done what she can to pave the way for those changes. She has performed in a way that will stand the test of time. “I’m proud of myself that I have been the same person from 2008 to 2022,” she said. “I’m not a pushover. I’m a leader, and not a follower. I stand up and speak on things that I believe.”In her last season, playing the role of on-court coach to a young and struggling Lynx team, she was averaging nearly 15 points and almost 10 rebounds per game through Minnesota’s 81-71 win Sunday over Atlanta.The fight for respect will now fall to other players as Fowles sets off for a profession that fits perfectly with a personality Bird described as motherly.For years, Fowles has studied to be an undertaker when not battling on the hardwood. You read that right — an undertaker. The back story: She has been entranced by funerals and their emotional resonance since she attended her grandmother’s memorial as a child. She sees worth in ensuring that the loved ones of the recently deceased know everything was handled right, to the end, with profound care.So one of the most remarkable women’s basketball players is retiring to help bury the dead? Indeed. It’s an incredible story that too few people know about.And that is a problem. More

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      Brittney Griner’s Tearful WNBA Teammates Play On After Her Conviction

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      Brittney Griner, the Phoenix Mercury star, was convicted on drug charges in Russia. Hours later, her teammates had a game. “Nobody even wanted to play today,” one said.UNCASVILLE, Conn. — Phoenix Mercury Coach Vanessa Nygaard and her coaching staff stood in the empty Mohegan Sun arena on Thursday, puzzled.The Mercury were set to take on the Connecticut Sun at 7 p.m., and her players were supposed to be on the court going through their normal pregame shoot-around, but no one showed up.Instead, the Mercury players were back in the locker room, glued to the television screen watching their teammate Brittney Griner’s conviction and sentencing on drug smuggling and possession charges earlier that day in a Russian court thousands of miles away. “It was like you’re waiting for a bomb to drop,” Mercury guard Diamond DeShields said.They watched with tear-filled eyes as Griner fought through her own tears and pleaded with a Russian court not to “end her life” for an “honest mistake.” Griner was sentenced to nine years in a Russian penal colony and fined 1 million rubles, or about $16,000. The sentence opens the door for Griner to be returned to the United States through a prisoner swap, but for the players, the news was still heartbreaking to hear.“And we’re still supposed to play this game,” Mercury guard Skylar Diggins-Smith said after the game, adding an expletive. “Nobody even wanted to play today. How are we even supposed to approach the game and approach the court with a clear mind when the whole group is crying before the game?”Phoenix Mercury guards Skylar Diggins-Smith, left, and Diamond DeShields said they had been emotional after Griner’s sentencing on Thursday. Kena Betancur/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesNygaard said the team had eventually gone through a “version” of the shoot-around, but nothing about the day or game felt normal. The most atypical moment of the night for Nygaard happened moments before tipoff, as the lights dimmed and players, coaches and referees locked arms in solidarity for 42 seconds — matching the number of Griner’s jersey. Fans chanted “We are B.G.” and “Bring her home.”“I even linked arms with a referee, so you know you’re never going to see that again,” Nygaard said with a smile.Griner has been detained in Russia since Feb. 17 after customs officials said they found hashish oil, a cannabis derivative, in Griner’s luggage at an airport near Moscow when she was traveling to the country to play for UMMC Yekaterinburg, a professional women’s basketball team. Griner said during her trial on drug charges that the hashish oil, in a vape pen, had been packed by mistake. Players across the W.N.B.A. and other professional athletes have campaigned fiercely for her freedom. In May, the U.S. State Department said that it had determined that Griner was “wrongfully detained” and that its officials would work to free her. Experts have said a prisoner swap is the most likely path for Griner’s release; the White House recently said it had made a “substantial” proposal.In the meantime, Griner’s teammates and fans have continued their public campaign of support.As fans filled the arena on Thursday night, they were greeted by Connecticut Sun dancers and arena staff members wearing “We are BG” T-shirts. Griner’s purple and orange No. 42 Mercury jerseys filled the stands along with variations of clothing with messages calling for her freedom. Mercury players donned the “We are BG” shirts in pregame warm-ups, as did the Connecticut coaching staff and several Sun players. Sun point guard Jasmine Thomas, who has been out injured, wore a hooded sweatshirt with a picture of Griner on the front and her No. 42 on the back.Sharon White, a Sun fan and a season-ticket holder since 2002, was among those wearing Mercury colors. She was wearing a purple T-shirt that featured Griner’s name and number, which she said she wears to every game regardless of the opponent.“When I get home, I wash it and I wear it again, even when they’re not playing,” White said, adding that her friends often make fun of her for how much she wears the shirt. White said she had cried as she watched Griner’s verdict on Thursday.Sharon White, a Connecticut Sun fan, said she always wears a purple Brittney Griner T-shirt, no matter who is playing, as a sign of support.Kris Rhim for The New York Times“It just hurts — I love her as a player, and it’s just a sad situation,” White said, wiping tears from her eyes. She added: “She doesn’t need to be there. When she comes home, she doesn’t need to go back. I think none of our players should go over there.”Many W.N.B.A. players go overseas during the off-season to play for international teams to supplement their income. Griner was shown holding up a picture of her UMMC Yekaterinburg team photo from behind bars on Thursday.Among those in the picture were Jonquel Jones, the Sun forward who won the W.N.B.A.’s Most Valuable Player Award last season. Jones, like Griner, has played for the Russian team for several years.Jones said she had never expected something like Griner’s detention to happen. After Griner’s arrest, Jones said she had learned that even cannabidiol oil, which she always carries with her to help with recovery from pain and injuries, was illegal in Russia.“My experiences over there have been so good,” Jones said. “Our team was top notch. They treated us like the professionals we are. We loved going over there because of that. So we just always felt safe. We never felt like anything would ever happen. So to see it happen to one of my teammates and be so close to it and understand that it could’ve been me, it puts it into perspective.”Jones said getting excited for Thursday’s game had been difficult; the moment of solidarity made her even more emotional.“It was like, ‘Dang, we did that, and now I got to go play basketball; my friend is still locked up overseas,’” Jones said. “So you just kind of go out there and do the best that you can do and not take the moment for granted, knowing that this is where she would want to be.”The Mercury lost the game, 77-64, with an 18-0 Sun run in the third and fourth quarters that put the game out of reach. Diggins was the game’s leading scorer, with 16 points, and Jones finished with 14. But for both sides, the numbers seemingly didn’t matter.“We’ll wake up tomorrow, and B.G. will still be in a Russian jail,” Nygaard said. “It’s day 169 or something tomorrow, and the clock continues, and we just want her to come home.” More

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      Why Brittney Griner and Other Athletes Choose Cannabis for Pain

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      Griner, the W.N.B.A. star detained in Russia on drug charges, is one of many athletes who have said cannabis helps with sports injuries. But it is banned by sports leagues and illegal in many places.Shawn Kemp played most of his N.B.A. career before the league began testing players for marijuana use in 1999. So after playing in the bruising, physical games typical of the N.B.A. in the 1990s, he would smoke. He didn’t like taking pain-relief pills.“I was able to go home and smoke pot, and it was able to benefit my body, calm my body down,” said Kemp, who is 6-foot-10 and was upward of 230 pounds during his 14-year career of highlight-reel dunks, mostly with the Seattle SuperSonics. He said the drug seemed to help with inflammation in his knees and other joints.Now Kemp, 52, owns a stake in a Seattle marijuana dispensary bearing his name.In the two decades since the N.B.A. and its players’ union agreed to begin testing for marijuana, or cannabis, the drug’s perception has undergone a makeover in the United States, where it has been illegal for decades. Researchers don’t fully understand its possible medical benefits or harmful effects, but it has become legal in many states and some professional sports leagues are reconsidering punitive policies around its use. Many athletes say they use cannabis for pain management.Brittney Griner is one of them.Griner, a W.N.B.A. star, was detained in Russia in February after customs officials said they found vape cartridges with hashish oil, a cannabis derivative, in her luggage. Cannabis is illegal in Russia, and Griner, 31, faces a 10-year sentence in a Russian penal colony on drug trafficking charges if she is formally convicted. She has pleaded guilty, but testified that she did not intend to pack the cartridges. Her legal team said she was authorized to use medicinal cannabis in Arizona, where she has played for the Phoenix Mercury since 2013.Griner’s case has drawn attention to the debate over marijuana use for recreation and relief. The U.S. State Department said it considered Griner to be “wrongfully detained” and would work for her release no matter how the trial ended. But in the United States, thousands of people are in prison for using or selling marijuana, and it remains illegal at the federal level even as dozens of states have legalized it for medicinal use or recreational use. It is banned in the W.N.B.A.Kemp and many others are urging sports leagues and lawmakers to change.Shawn Kemp at the grand opening of his cannabis shop in Seattle in 2020. He said his 14-year N.B.A. career might have been longer had he been able to use marijuana without penalty in his final years.Ted S. Warren/Associated Press“There’s still a lot for people to learn throughout the world with this stuff,” Kemp said. “And hopefully they will someday, where people will see cannabis oil and all these things and realize some athletes use this stuff to benefit their body, calm their body down from beating up their body so much on a daily basis.”Kemp said he was deeply saddened when he heard about Griner’s detention.“I’m such a fan of hers, to see her with that big, tall body to be able to move the way she does. She’s changed the game of the W.N.B.A.,” he said.In testimony at her trial, Griner described injuries to her spine, ankle and knees, some of which required her to use a wheelchair for months, according to Reuters. Like Kemp, the 6-foot-9 Griner has endured bumping and banging as she battled for rebounds and dunks. Many athletes believe marijuana is healthier for dealing with pain and anxiety than the addictive opioids and other medications historically prescribed by doctors.Eugene Monroe, a former N.F.L. player who has invested in cannabis companies, said he began using cannabis for pain relief after he realized other types of medications were not working for him.“Going into the building every day, getting Vicodin, anti-inflammatories — there was something about that, over time, that made me think: ‘Am I even needing these pills? Is this an addiction causing me to come in here and see the team doctor?’” Monroe said.The N.F.L. relaxed its marijuana policy in 2020 to allow for limited use, but it can still fine and suspend players for exceeding the limits. In the basketball leagues, only repeated offenses lead to a suspension. Griner will not face punishment from the W.N.B.A. if she returns to the league, an official who was not authorized to speak on the record because of the sensitivity of the matter told The New York Times.The N.B.A. halted testing when the coronavirus pandemic began, saying it was focusing on performance-enhancing drugs instead. Major League Baseball removed marijuana from its list of banned substances in 2019, but players can still be disciplined for being under the influence during team activities or breaking the law to use it (as, for example, they could be for driving under the influence of alcohol). The N.H.L. tests for marijuana, but does not penalize players for a positive result.Calvin Johnson, right, the former Detroit Lions star, with Rob Sims, his partner in a cannabis business, in June 2021. Johnson and Sims looked at marijuana plants for their business.Carlos Osorio/Associated PressLast year, Kevin Durant, the All-Star forward for the N.B.A.’s Nets, announced a partnership with the tech company Weedmaps, which helps users find marijuana dispensaries. “I think it’s far past time to address the stigmas around cannabis that still exist in the sports world as well as globally,” Durant told ESPN, which said he declined to discuss whether he used marijuana.Al Harrington, a retired N.B.A. player who has invested in cannabis companies, told GQ last year that he thought 85 percent of N.B.A. players used “some type of cannabis.”The W.N.B.A.’s Sue Bird has endorsed a cannabis products brand aimed at athletes. Lauren Jackson, a women’s basketball great, credited medicinal cannabis for her long-awaited return to the court this year after dealing with chronic knee pain. She is listed on the advisory board of an Australian company that sells cannabis products. Many former N.B.A. and N.F.L. players, like the retired Detroit Lions star Calvin Johnson, have invested in cannabis companies.About a month before Griner’s detention became public, the N.F.L. announced it had granted $1 million in total to the University of California, San Diego, and Canada’s University of Regina to study the effects of cannabinoids — the compounds in cannabis — on pain management. U.C. San Diego’s research will involve professional rugby players.Until recently, cannabis research has typically focused on abuse and whether it enhances performance in sports, rather than any potential benefits.In 2017, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine said a review of research since 1999 had shown “substantial evidence that cannabis is an effective treatment for chronic pain in adults.” But its review also found indications that cannabis use can hinder learning, memory and attention and that its regular use likely increases the risk of developing social anxiety disorders. There was also moderate evidence that regularly smoking marijuana could cause respiratory problems.Another review published in the Clinical Journal of Sport Medicine in 2018 found that early cannabis research showed a decrease in athletic performance. It also said there was little research examining cannabis use in elite athletes.Kevin Boehnke, a researcher at the University of Michigan’s Chronic Pain and Fatigue Research Center, said “cannabis tends to be safer” than anti-inflammatories and opioids that are often used for chronic pain.“That doesn’t mean it’s without risk,” he said, but added that the goal should be to use treatments that are the “lowest risk and most acceptable to the person who’s using it.”“At this point there’s not really a good justification from at least a pain management standpoint of why that should not be an available tool,” he said.Dr. David R. McDuff, the director of the sports psychiatry program at the University of Maryland, said many substance abuse referrals early in his career involved athletes who were binge-drinking alcohol. Later, he saw a shift to patients who were using cannabis.“If you look at the universe of people that use cannabis, about 10 percent of those will develop a cannabis use disorder,” said Dr. McDuff, who specializes in addiction and trauma. “They can be very serious. They usually will start by reducing motivation and initiative.”He said he was particularly concerned about how cannabis could affect adolescents’ brain development.Despite his caution, Dr. McDuff said he believes cannabis has medicinal properties that should be better studied. He said one barrier to that happening in the United States is marijuana’s federal classification as a Schedule I drug, meaning it is said to have no medical use and is likely to be abused. It is in the same category as drugs like heroin and ecstasy.Griner said she used cannabis products to manage pain from basketball injuries.Ethan Miller/Getty ImagesDennis Jensen, a researcher at McGill University in Montreal, said Canada’s 2018 marijuana legalization opened the door for more research there.“There’s a lot of anecdotes, there’s a lot of individual athlete reports, but the research does not necessarily support or refute anything that they’re saying as of yet,” he said.Riley Cote, a former member of the N.H.L.’s Philadelphia Flyers, said he tried marijuana as a youth player and found that it relieved his pain from fighting during games, even though he didn’t understand why. He co-founded Athletes for CARE, a nonprofit that promotes education and research for using cannabis and hemp as therapeutic alternatives. It receives some funding from cannabis product and branding companies.Anna Symonds, a professional rugby player and a member of Athletes for CARE, said she was heartbroken and frustrated when she learned why Griner had been detained. “It’s ridiculous that cannabis is criminalized, and that causes many more problems than it ever could solve,” she said.Symonds said she tried painkillers and muscle relaxants to ease the pain from muscle spasms and herniated and bulging discs in her back. Nothing, she said, worked like cannabis.Ricky Williams, a former N.F.L. player, said he hoped Griner’s situation would cause people to think about those imprisoned in the United States for cannabis-related offenses. Williams started a cannabis brand last year.He won the Heisman Trophy in 1998, but had a halting N.F.L. career in part because of discipline from the league related to his marijuana use.Ricky Williams, who played 11 seasons in the N.F.L., said using marijuana helped him realize he did not want to play football anymore.Photo By Eliot J. Schechter/Getty Images“I value feeling good, and I’m comfortable pushing the boundary of the rules, so I kept on going with it,” Williams said. “For me it became an issue because what I did for a living conflicted with my choice to consume cannabis.”Using marijuana helped him realize that playing football was not what he wanted to do for a living, he said.“I use cannabis now to accentuate what I do, not to deal with my life,” Williams said.While he believes cannabis helps with pain, he wishes its use was more widely accepted even for those without chronic pain.“I look forward to the day when the N.F.L. says, ‘This seems to really help our players, they really want it and we haven’t found any reason to not do it so let’s support it,’” Williams said. He added: “At least ask, have that conversation instead of just assuming that they’re doing something bad, and then punishing them. That was what happened to me and it doesn’t make any sense.”For Kemp, whose N.B.A. career ended in 2003, the changing mood about marijuana use among athletes like Griner is welcome, if perhaps too late for him. “I would have kept playing basketball if I could have used marijuana products back when I retired,” he said.He and his wife usually go out to see Griner’s Mercury play the Seattle Storm each summer. The teams’ matchups have come and gone this season, without the detained Griner, but she’s still on Kemp’s mind. “Hopefully she can get home with a safe return,” he said. “I miss seeing her play.” More

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      Bill Russell’s Words Were Worth the Wait

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      In wit and wisdom, Russell left an impression with his gravelly voice. “It wasn’t like he tried to impress you with big words,” said one recipient of his advice.Rare was the working person around N.B.A. arenas these past few decades who never had an encounter with the majestic Bill Russell. On occasion, mostly a special one, he was an intimidating presence walking tall and transcendent, in the manner of a man who had invented the game.In the dynastic measure by which we often relate to basketball, from Boston to Los Angeles to Chicago to Golden State, he actually did.Russell’s death at 88 on Sunday predictably evoked relished memories of meeting the most prolific instigator of championships in the history of American team sports. It is an indisputable fact that time with Russell was not generously dispensed. When it was, only the most hardheaded among us wasn’t better for it.I was a terrified young reporter for The New York Post in the late 1970s when my editor ordered me to “get Russell” for an assigned story. I found him in the media dining area at the old Spectrum arena in Philadelphia on a Sunday afternoon before a game he was working as network analyst.Bill Russell, left, with Brent Musburger during a CBS Sports broadcast in 1980.CBS, via Getty ImagesAs I hopelessly stammered through my introduction, Russell looked up from a plate of food and said nothing. Seconds felt like hours until Billy Cunningham, the 76ers coach, leaned over and came to my rescue. “He’s from Vecsey’s paper,” Cunningham told Russell, referring to Peter Vecsey, the widely known N.B.A. columnist.This apparently was a useful reference in what was a far more insular N.B.A. environment. Russell nodded and said, “Wait outside for me.” So I parked myself in the first row of seats behind the broadcast table. Ten minutes became 20, then 30, then 60 after Russell took a seat, donned his headset for microphone checks and shuffled through voluminous game notes and stats.I was literally sweating, and figuratively steaming. Finally, Russell summoned me, shook my hand and said, “Thank you for waiting and respecting my work.”Lesson learned: Patience may be the most well-cited virtue, but in the interests of professional achievement, so is preparation.Fast forward to a September 2007 afternoon in a Westchester County suburb of New York, where Russell was speaking to assembled N.B.A. rookies at the league’s transition program. I listened with fascination as Joakim Noah, a player of French, Swedish and Cameroonian descent, asked Russell if he felt underappreciated in racially polarized Boston despite winning 11 titles in 13 seasons, from 1957 through 1969.“Quite true,” Russell responded in his gravelly voiced, meditative manner. But he elaborated by relaying advice his father had given him as a youth about people who have “these little red wagons that get pulled around and that it’s got nothing to do with me” — meaning that he should not worry about how other people felt about him.Afterward, I asked Russell how that answer squared with his outspokenness and activism on matters of race and social justice, including his participation in the so-called 1967 Cleveland summit of prominent Black athletes in support of Muhammad Ali following his refusal to be drafted into the U.S. Army.He reminded me that he had been invited to address the rookie class at large, and that some of the newcomers were not African American. Some were not even American. Russell’s message had been tailored to universal temptation.“I tell all the kids — rich, poor, Black, white — that you must be your own counsel,” he told me. “We understand that we don’t always want to do the right thing, but what they have to ask themselves is, ‘Am I willing to deal with the consequences?’”Russell, right, with Joakim Noah during an N.B.A. event for rookies in September 2007. Suzy Allman for The New York TimesSuch contextual awareness sounded familiar to Len Elmore, the former pro center whom I have known since he finished his playing career with the Nets and Knicks before attending Harvard Law School. At Harvard, Elmore happened to befriend Russell’s daughter, Karen. (In 1987, Karen Russell wrote in The New York Times about the frightening, haunting harassment her father and family were subjected to in the Boston area.)“I had met him a few times in passing and I have a couple videos of my games he was calling, where he described me as ‘well traveled,’” Elmore said with a chuckle when I called him upon hearing of Russell’s passing. “He obviously had a big impact on me, as a center, always talking about blocking the shot but keeping it inbounds, things like that. And of course, off the court, too, with his activism during the civil rights era.”But it was in law school that Elmore said he actually got to talk to Russell about athlete activism, a subject Elmore has in recent years been teaching at Columbia University.“It wasn’t like he tried to impress you with big words,” Elmore said. “But what always came across was his wisdom, his ability to conceptualize, to prioritize, to understand time and place. I remember him telling me that by going to law school, I could be part of a generation that could build off what his generation had started, and effect change in a very different way.”For all the racism Russell and his Black teammates endured in Boston, and the disparities in how white and Black Celtics were paid and in some cases treated by an organization fronted by Red Auerbach, Russell was careful never to implicate the Celtics’ patriarch. For 10 years, Russell starred under Auerbach, who then made him the league’s first Black coach upon stepping away from the bench in 1966.Which leads me to my last Russell engagement, in May 2009, in a Manhattan hotel lounge while he was promoting a book, “Red and Me: My Coach, My Lifelong Friend,” published three years after Auerbach’s death.In the book, Russell wrote that he and Auerbach had seldom socialized or delved into personal or social issues. They were instead bound by basketball, by team, which also was, in effect, family. The patriarch was stubborn, set in his ways, Russell said. Russell’s own willful ways, shaped by a place in Boston and in America which Auerbach could never fully understand, formed the basis of their mutual respect.“We were so alike that way,” said Russell, who often made the point that he played for the Celtics, not Boston. But the team’s success always came first.That day in Manhattan, Russell shared some final coaching he’d gotten during his last visit with Auerbach, just as he took his leave. “Listen, Russ, this is something important,” Auerbach told him. “When you get old, don’t fall. Because that’s the start of the end. So remember: Don’t fall!”Russell, already 75, obviously knew that frailty would eventually visit him, too. Near the end of our interview, he admitted that he’d written the book because, “I also have to be mindful of my own mortality.”Those words barely spoken, he cut loose one of his trademark boisterous cackles.Athletic greatness fades. Team dynasties fold. But Bill Russell’s presence, deep into old age, didn’t so much as flicker. While the contemporary best-ever debate is laser focused on Air Jordan versus King James, Russell’s contextualization of the argument only required flashing the ring he wore that 2007 day at the rookie transition program — a gift from the N.B.A. commissioner at the time, David Stern, commemorating all 11 of Russell’s titles.That remains the truest measure of superstar affirmation within a team sport. It’s also the one all but guaranteed never to fall. More

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      Bill Russell’s Legacy, and Laugh, Touched Millions

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      Russell showed as much love and respect to younger players as they showed to him. Some, like Charles Barkley, referred to him simply as “Mr. Russell.”It was a day to celebrate Elgin Baylor, whom the Los Angeles Lakers had just honored with a statue outside their home arena. On that warm evening in April 2018, one of Baylor’s greatest antagonists showed up and sat prominently in the crowd.Bill Russell would never blend in anywhere, and certainly not in his green polo shirt at a Lakers event.Jerry West, Baylor’s teammate all those years ago, stood behind a lectern and couldn’t help but note Russell’s attendance.“All the losses to this gentleman over here,” West said. “I forget your damn name. What is it? Bill? Last name — Bill Russell, is that it?”The crowd loved the bit, and West continued.“There’s more incredible stories in a losing locker room — and particularly when it’s the same damn team and this smiling jackass over here.”A few feet away, Russell was indeed smiling, widely. He laughed throughout West’s performance. Russell led the Boston Celtics to 11 championships, seven of them with N.B.A. finals wins over the Lakers — and all of them colored in Celtics green.West played on six of those Lakers teams that lost to Russell’s Celtics, and the two became friends later in life. He made sure the assembled guests that day didn’t confuse his playful jabs for actual animus, telling them he loved Russell.It was a bit of a role reversal for Russell, who in his later years was usually the one delivering zingers. Deeply respected for what he did on the court and off it, his jabs were always met with laughter, and in the moments when he was sincere, his earnestness was met with profound gratitude from players for whom Russell changed the N.B.A.On Sunday, Russell’s family announced that he had died peacefully with his wife by his side. He was 88. The statement mentioned Russell’s championships — two in high school, two in college, one in the Olympics and 11 in the N.B.A. — nodded to his personal accolades and highlighted his lifelong fight against racial discrimination. It also included an entreaty that people keep Russell in their prayers. “Perhaps you’ll relive one or two of the golden moments he gave us, or recall his trademark laugh as he delighted in explaining the real story behind how those moments unfolded,” the statement read.The basketball world has celebrated him by remembering all of his life, including the moments of humor.As he received a lifetime achievement award in 2017, Russell, right, joked around with the former N.B.A. greats Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, left, Alonzo Mourning, Shaquille O’Neal, David Robinson and Dikembe Mutombo.Photo by Michael Loccisano/Getty Images for TNT“Where did they find all these tall people?” Russell asked, onstage at an N.B.A. awards show in 2017. The league had gathered other great centers — Shaquille O’Neal, Alonzo Mourning, Dikembe Mutombo, David Robinson and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar — to present Russell with a lifetime achievement award.He looked at the group intently and pointed at each of them. Then he cupped his hand around his mouth and, in a stage whisper, used colorful language to say he would beat them all.A year later he sat in the audience of the same awards show.“Mr. Bill Russell,” Charles Barkley, the Hall of Fame forward, said onstage, “thank you.”The camera panned to Russell who smiled and extended his middle finger to Barkley.Later that night, Russell posted an explanation on Twitter: “Sorry everyone, I forgot it was live TV & I can’t help myself whenever I see Charles it just is pure instinct.”His jokes often dripped with well-earned bravado, and they played well because of the awe with which the basketball players of future generations viewed him.They marveled at his talent on the court, how he became the most feared defender of his era — a dominant force before blocks became an official statistic. But even more than that they respected the way he became the N.B.A.’s first Black superstar in an era of segregation, who was born in the Jim Crow South and fought racism in society and in the N.B.A. Russell once led a strike of a game in Kentucky after he and his Black teammates were denied service at a restaurant. In the 1950s, he spoke out about the N.B.A.’s unofficial quota system that prevented more Black players from being in the league.There are some Hall of Fame players who aren’t shy about sharing their opinion that the recent basketball eras were much worse than their own.As Russell aged, though, he often showed that he reciprocated the love and respect he garnered from some of the game’s younger stars.Russell often spoke fondly of the former Lakers star Kobe Bryant, right. He talked about their friendship when he was inducted into the Hall of Fame as a coach last year.Photo by: Ron Hoskins/NBAE via Getty ImagesAt the All-Star Game in 2008, a camera caught him sharing a tender moment with Lakers guard Kobe Bryant.“I watch a lot of your games,” Russell told Bryant.“Thank you,” Bryant said, with a smile spreading on his face.Russell told Bryant that when he watches games he tries to understand what certain players’ agendas are in those games, and then see how well they were able to carry out their plan.“Me too,” Bryant said, eagerly. “But I got that because I read your book.”The two shared a laugh and then Russell told Bryant he was as proud of him as if he were his own son. Bryant thanked him again and they embraced.Years later, Bryant said that Russell had become a mentor for him, that he simply picked up the phone to call and ask for Russell’s advice.On Jan. 26, 2020, Bryant died in a helicopter crash with his daughter Gianna and seven other people. The Lakers and Celtics played each other in Los Angeles a few weeks after the crash. Russell attended the game wearing a Lakers jersey — Bryant’s jersey — and a hat with Bryant’s initials stitched in purple inside a yellow heart.Their relationship transcended the bitter Lakers-Celtics rivalry just as Russell’s relationship with West did.He also shared a special bond with Kevin Garnett, who in 2008 took the Celtics to their first N.B.A. finals since 1987. Garnett started his career with the Minnesota Timberwolves, but was traded to the Celtics in 2007.“You’re my favorite player to watch; you never disappoint me,” Russell told Garnett in an arena hallway during that season. ESPN aired the footage in 2008 before an interview between Russell and Garnett.“You crack so many jokes,” Garnett said. “I don’t know if that’s real or not.”“No, it’s real,” Russell replied, as Garnett’s laughter turned serious. “And you never disappointed me. And you finally got in the right uniform.”The clip then showed an interview between Russell and Garnett. They sat in chairs across from each other, beside a backdrop of Celtics memorabilia.“I think that you’re going to win at least two or three championships here,” Russell said. “And if you don’t but I see you play the way you should play, I’ll share one of mine with you.” He added: “If you play the way you play and you dedicate yourself to doing it, they will come.”Later in the conversation, Russell gave Garnett a similar message to the one he gave Bryant.“I couldn’t be any more proud of you than I am of my own kids,” Russell said.Russell and Garnett looked at each other meaningfully. It was hard to tell exactly behind his square cut glasses, but Russell’s eyes seemed to moisten as he spoke to Garnett.He ended with a joke about how Garnett’s No. 5 was close to No. 6, his own number, and then laughed, his voice booming, raspy and bubbly all at once — a laugh few who had heard it could ever forget. More