Transcript
Tina Charles (0:01)
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Sue Bird (1:08)
Ready lit a little bit.
Tina Charles (1:09)
A little, little bit? Yeah, a little bit. Yo, how'd your meeting go? And you're like yeah, good. Like you know I'm on the team. Hahaha. We're like yeah da da da. And then you were like but Coach Ayama told me you two said I don't pass enough. And we were like, I actually think the words were coach or Ayama said you two call me a black hole. Today's guest is Tina Charles. Tina is a future WNBA hall of Famer. She's an mvp, a two time scoring champ, eight time all star and a three time Olympic gold medalist. She was selected to the WNBA All Defensive team four times and made the All WNBA team nine times. She's also someone I've known for a very long time. And before we get into this interview, I do want to pull back the curtain a little bit because something interesting happened a few weeks ago. We recorded what was supposed to just be a regular old full episode and you're going to hear a chunk of that shortly. And it was a great conversation. We went to dinner that night and we're just hanging out, we're talking and it was in that conversation that she started to to express like wanting to talk about more. I kind of asked her like how do you think the interview went? And she was like great. But I would have said more here or I would have dug deeper there or I would have told that story here. And it really got me thinking. I think at times I've tried to maybe just avoid having those types of conversations. Not sure if the person on the other side of the interview is down to go deeper. But then I realized, you know, through Tina, that I can be a safe place if players do want to do that. So this interview is a little different in that it's going to be a two parter. We recorded the first part two weeks ago. We sat down again for part two. Try to get into those layers a little bit and hopefully you guys enjoy it. But before we get to that, you know what time it is. Time for Sue's view. All right, first up, for Sue's view, the European Championships are over. So we've got a lot of the European players that left. They're now back. Of course, the one that really jumps out in terms of her impact is leonie fibish. New York is 11 and one when Phoebus is there and two and five without her, she has the second highest net rating on the team outside of John Cole Jones, which obviously plays a huge role because they've also been without jj. But I digress because I'm not really bringing this up just to highlight Phoebus. When you look around the league and you see the signing of European players as free agents, it's having an impact and they might not be making the All Star team, so it's not that type of impact, but they are surely like tipping the scale for a lot of teams. And I just think it's been really interesting to both. You know, I'll give a shout out to GMs here to both watch GMs kind of navigate this space, go out and find the talent and then sign it, right? So you're talking New York Liberty signing Leonie Phoebus. You're talking Phoenix Mercury signing Moni Koa Makani, the Golden State Valkyries with Janelle Salon. So this is happening a lot in free agency. And the real reason I bring it up is first, I know firsthand about that impact. In 2010, we signed Jana Vesela, a player from Czech Republic. She had, first of all, she was so versatile. Actually reminds me a lot of Phoebus, or Phoebus reminds me of her. Could shoot threes, could post up, played tough defense. She was 6, 4. It's almost carbon copy. And that impact was felt. I mean, we won a championship because of her. She was a big key to that roster. But she only stayed one year. She only stayed one year. I'm sure most of that is because of the money. And now that we're going to have a new cba, which will likely increase the salary, I'm just starting to think like, are we going to see more European players? More than that, are we going to see more European players drafted? Because what you saw this year with golden state, with their fifth pick, they went out and drafted 19 year old. You say Yochite from Lithuania as like an investment, right? Because what these European players are surely proving is that they play overseas in their home countries or somewhere in euroleague. They build their game, they get mature in their game, they come over, they have impact. Another great example of that we're actually seeing with the Connecticut sun right now. Layla Lacan got drafted last year, brought over this year she's just getting started, but in their win against Seattle, she had like 8 points on 50% shooting, so. So I'm starting to wonder. It's not something we've never seen. We've seen European players get drafted for sure. But I'm wondering if this is going to become just something that teams do more often, right? Like draft the youngster that has potential that you can get the rights to early on as opposed to having to find them in free agency. So just something I'm thinking about next up, the All Star teams are set. They've been announced and this year there are three, three rookies. Paige Beckers, Sonia Citron and Kiki Iriafin. And I'm bringing this up just to have a little bit of like history talk. The WNBA Instagram page actually had the same idea I did, which was like, how many times have there been multiple rookies? So they actually did the research for me. I'm really thankful for that. But I wanted to go like a little bit deeper on not just rookies, but actually rookies that made the All Star team as reserves. Because that's a little bit different, right? Like the coaches are choosing the reserves. It kind of takes out, for lack of a better, like the popularity contest of it all. Does it make it better or worse now it's just different to get selected as a reserve as opposed to a starter. So for Kiki and Sonya, they got picked as reserves. So to take it back, 1999 was the first all star game and we saw seven rookies making it. This is like a little bit different. I do think there's a tiny asterisk next to this game because the league was so new. So rookie didn't necessarily mean like someone from college. It could have just been somebody coming from the ABL or somebody coming from Europe. So it is a little bit different. But they did have seven. And actually what I noticed there was they had six reserves. So technically it's the most all time. But Shamika holds claw. I think that makes her the first rookie ever voted in as an All Star. So fun little fact. In the 2002 All Star Game, which is my rookie year, it was myself, Stacey Dales and Tamika Catchings. Stacy was a reserve that year, so that's just one. 2006 had four rookies. Simone Augustus, Sophia Young, Malcolm, Cappy Pondexter and Candace Dupree. And they were all reserves. And then 2011, which is the last time there was, I think three or more. He had four rookies go in. Courtney Vandersloot, Daniel Adams, Liz Cambage, and Maya Moore. That's three reserves Maya got voted in. So I guess 2000, technically 1999, but really 2006 takes the award for most reserves. But I'm just going to go out on a limb here and say that my rookie year, 2002, the game was in D.C. i was selected as a. As a starter. I'm going to go out a limb and say that that starting team was for a rookie. Like, I don't think you can beat it. Undefeated. I started with Lisa Leslie, Cheryl Swoopes, Tina Thompson, and Tisha Panachero. I mean, come on. Unbelievable. You could imagine my eyes were like. Anyways, okay, last but not least, dejuana Bonner has officially signed in Phoenix and played in her first game out there. Real quick, you know, the saga's over. She's now on a team. She's back in Phoenix. I think it's a great story for her to go back home, you know, the franchise where she started. I also think it fits her basketball wise. Nate Tibbets, his style is, you know, kind of like positionless. Have a lot of skill players. DB can play the three, she can play the four. She's a matchup nightmare at the four. I think she gives traditional fours some headaches, especially with the. The space that Phoenix is gonna naturally create with the way they play. She can also take guards into the post, so that gives them them that look. But as we've talked about with Phoenix, what makes them good is actually their defense. And I think Dibi has a versatility there as well, so it'll be interesting to see if she helps with that as well. Yeah, so that's what I'm seeing. And that's it for Sue's view. Let's get to the interview. So, Tina, here's your chance. Officially your chance. My chance to tell the world the truth.