Locked On Women’s Basketball: Why has Paige Bueckers’ draft fate been compared to Eli Manning’s?

Copeland first reflected on Bueckers’ recent unwillingness to commit to the idea of playing in Dallas:

“I wasn’t shocked,” Copeland said. “I know, sure, if she got to sit there and pick anywhere to start her career, would Dallas be the first choice? No, I don’t think so. But this is the way the system is set up right now. And I never got the feeling that she was ready to take on the system and force her way out and and people were talking about her going and sitting out a whole year and playing in Europe instead, or just doing Unrivaled and Europe and waiting. None of that sounded like legitimate options to me, especially for someone who’s had those injuries and had to sit out, it never made sense to me that she was going to sit out a whole season. For someone who’s such a basketball junkie as she is, who’s been waiting her entire life to play in this league, who has lost a lot of time in these last couple years, and understands that time is fleeting, and anything could possibly happen.”

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Then, the two discussed how Dallas has evolved over the years, and why Bueckers may be less inclined to start her WNBA career with the Wings:

“I think maybe the best way to put it is, it seems like an organization that hasn’t had a very clear cut outline of how they wanted to proceed,” Copeland explained. “And that’s just from a roster building scenario, and that’s before you start to look at things like facilities and the other outside things … You know, there’s all these things that kind of happen off the court also that often tend to influence these decisions, and it just hasn’t been, I think in WNBA conversations, when you’re looking at teams and you’re seeing how different clubs run and things like that, I just don’t think right now that they’ve had the best reputation. So kind of when you when you start looking at all those other things, that’s why I think there might be some hesitation, or people start to question, why it’s not the most highly ranked team when it comes to all of those other things that kind of surround what’s going on in between the lines.”

“I also think you take a look at the stars that have left in the most recent years. I mean, Satou Sabally did not stick around,” Powell responded. “And her free agency happened after the Wings got the number one overall pick. So even with the [prospect] of potentially drafting Paige Bueckers, it wasn’t enough to keep Satou Sabally in market.”

Copeland added: “And [Sabally] was blunt about it. She was down in Unrivaled, and said, ‘I’ve played my last game in Dallas.’ And we were all like, ‘Woah, all right,’ that was before free agency started. Free agency was starting like in another week or so, and she said it clearly that, ‘hey, I’m moving on.'”

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Powell continued: “When you talk about player amenities, it’s not just about a practice facility and an arena. Amenities also mean having a full time training staff and a set of team doctors that can really care for the athletes. So I did some homework, and I looked up the Wings training and medical staff, and looked into their backgrounds and did some reporting, and I can report that the majority of their medical and training staff are mostly seasonal contractors. And so what that means is the organization isn’t putting in the financial resources or wherewithal into the professionals that need to keep the players healthy, not just during the [season], but all year long. And so I can also report that their team doctor has his own practice, but several players who needed surgeries had them done by someone else who’s affiliated with a major hospital. So the reason I bring up these types of amenities is because of who Paige Bueckers is. She’s a player who has been injury prone, and a player like that would want to go into a situation where they knew there was investment being made into their health and into their well being, to be able to have the most prosperous career as possible. And so the reason things didn’t go well for the Dallas Wings last year was because so many players got injured at once. It’s not always bad luck and a coincidence. So I think it is just worth putting that out there that this is another reason why there are reservations about the Dallas Wings, and that’s just what the facts are, when it comes to what that organization has currently been investing and spending in their players.”

Tune in to hear more from Copeland and Powell about Bueckers’ many options, and which direction it seems most likely for her to go. Make sure to subscribe to the Locked On Women’s Basketball podcast to keep learning about the WNBA, women’s college basketball, basketball history and much more!