Regarding the Brouhaha About Mechelle Voepel's Content Moving to ESPN Insider

It would be a lot easier for me to take a side if

a) I could get a free trial to look around and see if the entirety of the women's basketball content was worth subscribing to, rather than just taking ESPN's word for it, and
b) if there were an easy way to bow out if I enrolled and decided some time later that I didn't wish to pay for it anymore - reading comments from former ESPN Insider subscribers on the web, it seems that ESPN makes the process as difficult as they can.

Although, if you choose ESPN Insider, they will send you some brightly colored toilet paper called ESPN: The Magazine. (It's not good if you're allergic to certain dyes, though.)

Dream Pass in Monarchs Dispersal Draft

The dispersal draft for the Sacramento Monarchs was held today. By the time they got down to the Dream, Chelsea Newton was still available. However, the Dream passed and Newton ended up with the Storm.

Incidentally, Chelsea Newton's PER last year was 9.91, the kind of PER for a player hanging on the edge of the league. (Shalee Lehning's PER was 8.73, incidentally) I think that the Dream were wise to pass up on a player who has scored 5.1 ppg and 1.6 apg in a five-year career.

Monarchs Watch: Day 7

While President Donna Orender of the WNBA posts her Much to be Thankful For which can be linked from the WNBA front page, the link which states that the WNBA is trying to find a home for the Monarchs has finally disappeared. This doesn't mean that the WNBA isn't actively looking for a new owner for the Monarchs - and they're not going to be looking during the Holidays - but if the WNBA is planning to kill the Monarchs this is the right time to end any Monarchs talk, namely when everyone is looking at a turkey leg. (Or imitation tofurkery leg.)

nickv1025 over at Rebkell suggested that the WNBA's strategy is to quietly let the Monarchs die, but to offer a carrot with the stick. Namely, to state that they would increase the roster sizes of each team from 11 to 12, with the 12th player remaining inactive if the other 11 players are healthy - or likewise, to make it more simple for an injured player to stay on the roster. This also makes it more likely that the Monarchs players could find a safe landing spot.

Mechelle Voepel over at her blog page states:

All business owners have to think in business terms if they want to be successful. And yet it never fails to amaze me how so many people who reach power through successful businesses can sometimes fall so far short of the responsible way to deal with other people, particularly their employees.

Certainly, the Maloofs had the right to pull out of the WNBA if they felt it was financially too burdensome for them. But they could have said proper farewells to the players and those who worked for the Monarchs organization. They could have faced the music in that way.

I'm in complete agreement. It wasn't that the Maloofs dropped the Monarchs, it's the way that it was handled. The fomer Monarchs org didn't even have the common decency to inform their players individually - they were left to find out about it from other sources or to be surprised by the initial announcement.

Of course, I don't expect any news over the Thanksgiving holiday - but this is the first day in the national press since last Friday's announcement that there was no mention of the Monarchs at all, not even in an opinion article. Whether there will be an effort to save the Monarchs, or whether everyone will say "You know what? After the Shock, the Dream, and the Fever being in peril this year, we're just too tired to care anymore." And that would be a shame, particularly on Thanksgiving.

Mechelle Voepel Writes About Atlanta Change of Ownership

Her new article can be read at the ESPN website:

"I am a businesswoman, first and foremost. I believe that to be successful, you have to -- at the end of the day -- make money. I can sell something when I'm passionate about the product. Developing more sponsorships and continuing to get the community active in the Atlanta Dream is something that will come naturally to me."

Betty is a graduate of Alabama, while her husband's alma mater was Georgia Tech. Both of them became very supportive of Yellow Jackets sports. But Betty said it was a talk by Georgia Tech women's hoops coach MaChelle Joseph to the school's athletic board a few years back that really hit home for her.

"I thought, 'You know, I could help,' " Betty said. "It really got me interested in supporting them at a different level, not just to be a fan. But to also reach out and make a real difference."

I'm hoping that Kathy Betty can make the Dream a success both on the court and at the turnstiles.

Orender Bails...IN

According to Mechelle Voepel at ESPN2, Donna Orender has declined the opportunity to move on to the LPGA:

"I believe in the promise of what everyone thought this league could be when it started 13 seasons ago, and it's going to continue to grow," Orender said Sunday. "The impact basketball has on young girls and the society at large is incredible. I've invested a lot of time in this, and have worked with really great people. I want to keep being part of that growth."

In addition, some information is provided about possible future changes in how the best-of-three rounds will be organized.

Voepel Implies that Lehning Will Play in Playoffs

An article by Mechelle Voepel for her old newspaper, the Kansas City Star, implies that Lehning will play in the playoffs:

Lehning laughed through the ache as she said that. Her coach, Marynell Meadors, acknowledges that when the collision happened, she feared a serious head or neck injury. Thankfully, it wasn’t that. But Lehning — who didn’t return in that game — still has an injured left shoulder that leaves her availability for tonight’s WNBA playoff opener with Detroit as a game-time decision.

“It’s going to take something pretty significant to keep me out,” Lehning said. “Tape it up and play.”

Meadors said, “She’s pretty banged-up. But she’s just a tough kid. Oh my goodness, is she tough.”


I doubt that Lehning is going to play. If she does play, we're going to have to give her a nickname. Like "True Grit" or something.

Voepel: McCoughtry ROY, Meadors COY

Mechelle Voepel makes her selections for WNBA awards at ESPN. Her choices:

Most Valuable Player: Diana Taurasi, Mercury.
Rookie of the Year: Angel McCoughtry, Dream.
Coach of the Year: Marynell Meadors, Dream.
Sixth Woman of the Year: DeWanna Bonner, Mercury.
Defensive Player of the Year: Tamika Catchings, Fever.
Most Improved Player of the Year: Erika de Souza, Dream.

All-First Team: Taurasi (Mercury), Pondexter (Mercury), Jackson (Storm), Catchings (Fever), Hammon (Silver Stars)
All-Second Team: Parker (Sparks), Leslie (Sparks), Anosike (Lynx), Douglas (Fever), Nolan (Shock)

Mechelle Voepel Writes About Sancho Lyttle

Mechelle Voepel, ESPN reporter and women's basketball reporter extraordinaire, devotes a column at ESPN to Sancho Lyttle.

An excerpt:

In Atlanta, Lyttle definitely has found a good home on court. She's having her best season in the WNBA, averaging 13.3 points, 7.6 rebounds and 2.1 steals. And she has been well-matched inside with center Erika de Souza and forward Chamique Holdsclaw.

"When I first started, I was a '5' player with my back to the basket, so everything that I did was from there," Lyttle said. "And then every year, different coaches put me in different spots, so I kept getting further from the basket. Now, I'm playing more as a 4, and so there's always something new for me to learn.

"My game is changing a lot -- I can still post up, but now I've got to shoot more, flash more. The learning curve is still going to be there every year."

Teasley Talks about Latta Being Cut (?)

Mechelle Voepel has a new article up called "Revisiting Teasley's recent thoughts is rather eerie" She had spoken with Teasley a few weeks ago and they talked about...Ivory Latta being cut from the team. Now, it's Teasley that's been cut.

A quote:

So how does someone go from a starter to being cut from the team? It’s definitely odd, but consider that it happened to both Latta (starting almost all last season and being cut at the start of this year) and Teasley.

At what point this season did Atlanta coach/GM Marynell Meadors start worrying she had made a big mistake about her backcourt? Did it take a while before she could bring herself to admit it? Or is she now pulling the plug on Teasley too soon?

The AP Poll: How Accurate Is It?

Mechelle Voepel posted recently on her blog regarding the confusion, anxiety and upset stomachs that the release of the preseason Associated Press poll causes in women's basketball. One of the problems regarding the poll is that it becomes very difficult to follow so many teams, and voters are taking semi-educated guesses as to which teams deserve high rankings...when they don't really know as much as they should about the teams in question.

As it turns out, I had some questions of my own about the AP accuracy and yesterday, I compared the preseason AP poll with the final AP poll in women's basketball over the past five years. I wanted to determine if certain teams consistently finished better than they were predicted to at the beginning of the season, i. e. was there a set of teams that was consistently underrated? Likewise, were there programs that were consistently overrated?

I looked at the last five years for every program appearing in the AP poll. I then compared the poll position at the beginning of the year to the position at the end of the year. If Texas Tech, for example, were to be ranked #9 in the preseason poll and end up ranked #13 in the final poll, Tech would receive a rating of -4 for that season - Tech was an overrated team that finished four positions lower than expected. Likewise, if Stanford was at #15 in the preseason poll and finished #6 in the final poll, Stanford would get a rating of 9 for that season, finishing nine positions higher than expected. The numerical +/- would be added together over the last five years and divided by five for a final ranking.

There were two problems, both depending on the data. First, the problem of teams falling out of the poll completely by the end of the year. Second, the problem of teams appearing in the final poll that didn't appear at all in the preseason poll. I had values for the "#26 and further" positions for four of the previous five preseasons, but the number of votes teams receive below #25 drops off very rapidly and can't be considered very reliable.

Therefore, if a team ranked in the preseason poll fell out of the final poll, I gave it the benefit of the doubt and treated the team as if it fell to the imaginary #26 position. Likewise, I assumed that late-appearing teams had been strong all along (just not noticed) and moved them up from an imaginary #26 position in the preseason (ignoring the actual team that was 26th in votes received) and moving those teams up from the #26 position to their final positions in the poll.

I then looked at teams that have appeared in either a preseason or final poll in the last five seasons. Here are the five most overrated teams:

Georgia -6.8
Texas -6.2
Minnesota -4.2
Texas Tech -4.2
LSU -2.6 (tie)
Michigan State -2.6 (tie)
Notre Dame -2.6 (tie)

Any year where you were ranked in the preseason poll and fell completely out of the final poll is going to hurt you. Georgia was ranked #9 in the preseason in 2007-08 but finished a disappointing 8-6 in SEC play and ended up a #8 seed in the NCAA tournament. Texas was ranked #12 in the 2005-06 season but finished 13-15 that year and ended up losing to Iowa State in the first round of the Big Twelve Tournament - Texas went to neither the NCAA or WNIT postseason.

So who are the most underrated teams?

North Carolina 3.2
Maryland 2.8
Oklahoma 2.6
Louisiana Tech 2.4
Baylor 2.4

Looking at the rankings overall, one can conclude either:

a) the voters' preseason ratings actually match their final ratings very well. It's rare for a team, on the average, to be off more than three positions from their eventual final rating over a five year span of time.
b) voters make sure that the final ratings reflect their preseason prejudices - they remember how they voted in the preseason and don't want to be seen as straying too far away in the final vote.

Therefore, here at Pleasant Dreams, I am going to "adjust" the 2008-09 AP Preseason Poll, taking into account how voters have voted in the past, and how well past predictions regarding certain programs have been.

2008-09 Preseason

1 Connecticut
2 Stanford
3 Maryland
4 Oklahoma
5 Rutgers
6 North Carolina
7 Tennessee
8 Duke
9 California
10 Louisville
11 Texas A&M
12 Vanderbilt
13 Texas
14 Oklahoma State
15 Virginia
16 Notre Dame
17 Arizona State
18 Ohio State
19 Baylor
20 Auburn
21 Florida State
22 Xavier
23 Purdue
24 LSU
25 Old Dominion

2008-09 Predicted Final

1 Maryland
2 Oklahoma
3 Connecticut
4 North Carolina
5 Stanford
6 Duke
7 Rutgers
8 Tennessee
9 Texas A&M
10 Vanderbilt
11 California
12 Louisville
13 Oklahoma State
14 Virginia
15 Baylor
16 Arizona State
17 Notre Dame
18 Ohio State
19 Texas
20 Purdue
21 Florida State
22 Auburn
23 LSU
24 Xavier
25 Pittsburgh

Regarding Mechelle Voepel

When I began checking my weblinks this morning, the Women's Hoops Blog alerted me to some shocking news: Mechelle Voepel is no longer at the Kansas City Star.

Cutbacks, so they say.

Hopefully, Voepel will still be at ESPN. ESPN still supports Voepel's columns on women's basketball. It would be a shame for Voepel not to have the bigger platform that she deserves.

I hate to change the subject, but I have to write a few things about myself. I've not been following women's basketball for very long. Oh, I was certainly interested in reading about it now and then but I didn't so much follow it as pay attention to it. I knew that Tennessee won lots of championships and that some teams were very good and others not so good.

I began following the sport when the Atlanta Dream came to town. I've always been a big believer in supporting the hometown team. I felt that the WNBA was a worthwhile enterprise and deserved some support, and I dipped my toe into the big blogging pool and began looking for information and reading the papers for information about my beloved Dream and all matters women's basketball.

This process of discovery was illuminating. It didn't exactly transform me into an acolyte of Andrea Dworkin, but it taught me a lot of unpleasant truths.

One of the truths I was taught is that a lot of men have a passionate hatred of women's sports. Despite their protestations to the contrary, it seems that their anger is based on gender. Their hatred of women's sports has a lot to do with their hatred of women, period.

I began reading the Atlanta Journal-Constitution and Sports Illustrated with a critical eye. I began to play a game whenever I crossed a copy of the AJC - "guess the percentage". This cruel game involved picking out how much space on the AJC's sports page would be devoted to women's sports. I could win that game by guessing a number in the low single digits - some days, in the very low single digits. I think one day the percentage was actually 0.1 percent.

(The arguments go that women's sports aren't popular, therefore they don't deserve space. Why aren't they popular? Because they go unnoticed. Why do they go unnoticed? Because no print space is devoted to them.)

Sports Illustrated? Not much better. You can still win with that single-digit percentage guess. Except, of course, with the swimsuit issue.

In short, women's sports is invisible in a lot of quarters. The words "toil under obscurity" come to mind. And there are a lot of forces that want to keep it that way.

Writers like Mechelle Voepel are a light in the darkness. Intelligent sports commentary about a sport I like. And now, the Kansas City Star just put out the light.

"Cutbacks". Like a knife.

Women's Hoops Blog argues that we should e-mail the Kansas City Star to let them know our displeasure. I always felt a little hypocritical in doing that. Not only did I never read the KC Star, I never had the opportunity to read it. Writing a very prim and proper "you suck" missive doesn't make sense to me. What am I going to do, threaten to stop buying a paper I never read in the first place?

Think about it this way, though. Maybe the reason the Kansas City Star doesn't make any money is because they report about the same old boring garbage that other sports papers report about. Some pieces on the big three pro sports. College sports. Guy sports. A few columns of bloviating. And some advertisements.

And now, one less reason for women (and men) to read the sports page. One less reason to pick up a copy of the Kansas City Star.

(I ran out of reasons to buy an Atlanta Journal-Constitution.)

Maybe you should let the Kansas City Star know about the consequences of their decision. I just did. As for me, I have a new blog to read.