Transcript
A (0:00)
Are you shaving your legs? Are you. What are you doing? In order to give yourself those milliseconds that you're gonna.
B (0:08)
I'd be like shaving my head. Attention, the party is about to commence. Welcome to the party. What's up party people? I'm Julie Foudy.
A (0:29)
And I'm Abby Wambach.
B (0:31)
Abigail, I have been dying to talk to you. I know, I know you had parents weekend. I was away at Mia. Mia Ham's golf tournament. But we need to talk about Nafiza Collier's please exit interview from last week on Tuesday. Oh my gosh. Okay, so in her exit interview for the 2025 season, Minnesota Link Star and WNBPA, that's their players association Vice president Nafisa Collier, called out WNBA commissioner Kathy Engelbert in a four minute red statement that went scorched earth. I mean, it was bold, it was brave, and here is just a glimpse of it.
A (1:17)
We have the best players in the world, we have the best fans in the world, but right now we have the worst leadership in the world.
B (1:23)
She went on to say in that four minutes that the league leadership has been tone deaf, dismissive, willing to sabotage its own product and caring more about control and power than innovation or collaboration. And to a player, to a player, from Caitlin Clark to Asia Wilson to Angel Reese to Paige Beckers, just to name a few, they all supported Fee's statement, which tells you I think so much. And, and mind you, Fee is cerebral and thoughtful and is not prone to big, you know, reactions, but you could tell she had had enough. Enough. Yeah, I get it. I understand. What was your reaction to it?
A (2:17)
Yeah, I mean, first of all, well done, Fee. The league and the players are in this kind of chess match right now working towards signing a deal and coming to terms. And I think that, you know, this is an evidence of how far apart they might really be and these frustrations that the players have and, and Fee stepping up, like it's not an easy position to be asked or to want to step up in the position that, that she did by calling the league out, by specific, specifically naming Kathy in some of the private conversations that they had, which I thought was like kind of brilliant strategically. I think that this is what the WNBA has to do in order to reach the deal that's going to serve them in the best possible way. They have to call the league out where they see holes, where they see gaps, where they see problems. And, and I don't think that it's wrong that that Fee is saying that the The. That the league is trying to have control and power, because that is essentially what the problem is. The league doesn't want the players to have as much control as the players want. And this is the biggest issue. When, you know, we had this with US Soccer, what did you think? Like, what's your overall reaction?