Every top-level team sport always has some players who love to get under the opponents' skin. It works because they get frustrated, which makes them make rash decisions. In basketball, players love verbally going at each other as they can rattle each other.
Las Vegas Aces star Kelsey Plum appeared on All The Smoke to discuss what happens during the trash-talk sessions. Thankfully, trash-talk is universal, so it was easy for people to understand how the WNBA works in that aspect.
"I only talk when someone talks to me first. If I get going, I get going but to me, I feel like, honestly, people feel insecure," Plum said on All The Smoke. "You should see some of the things say in W games. I don't know if they'll ever mic us up, but we talk like y'all talk. It might be even cattier. There is no difference to the NBA, it's probably more personal too."
The W has legitimate rivalries between players
Fans love watching the WNBA because of its quality and its difference from the NBA. However, drama happens around the league between the most competitive players.
Over the past few seasons, Marina Mabrey and DiJonai Carrington have locked horns. They always went at each other by talking trash and being physical, leading them to dislike each other. It became even more awkward right before the 2024 WNBA All-Star break because Mabrey was traded to the Connecticut Sun to join Carrington.
The same happened with Kahleah Copper and Sophie Cunningham, fierce rivals during the 2021 WNBA Finals between the Sky and the Phoenix Mercury. Nowadays, they are teammates, putting their past of talking trash and being physical to the side for the team's benefit.
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The WNBA always had trash talk
The discourse surrounding trash talk and physicality got a bit weird earlier in the 2024 season when Chennedy Carter and Caitlin Clark got involved with each other. They were physical for almost the whole game, but a specific foul away from possession led to Clark being on the ground.
It was part of their matchup because both players were jawing at each other for almost the whole game. What made it even more exciting was that they were the stars for both the Sky and the Indiana Fever.
Unfortunately, that led some people within the basketball community to misinterpret the trash-talk and physicality as personal issues, including her post-game comments about three-point shooting .
Former WNBA All-Star Chiney Ogwumike spoke about it on ESPN, saying the Carter foul was unnecessary. However, she wanted to normalize talking trash to each other because it's just basketball, as it happens in the NBA. It was also Plum's point on All the Smoke, which makes it a consistent reality in the W.
"For those new to this, the WNBA has always been a physical league, full of competitive fire and trash talk," Chiney said on an ESPN segment in June 2024.
Basketball fans will get excited seeing that kind of dynamic in the WNBA. It should be expected because Plum said they are the same as the men when messing with each other's peace on the W court.
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