One high profile rookie from the vaunted 2024 WNBA class is not happy and it has nothing to do with league salaries, social media attacks or ratings for Unrivaled League.
LA Sparks Holding Male Practice Player Tryouts
Cameron Brink’s WNBA team, The Los Angeles Sparks, announced that they were looking for male players to practice against throughout the season. This isn’t a new concept, as elite women’s college teams dating back decades, utilized male players to give their teams an advantage with speed of the game and physicality.
Elite women’s college basketball teams like South Carolina give a lot of credit to their all-male practice squads. While male practice teams are common at the college level, that approach is utilized much in the WNBA.
Cameron Brink Isn’t Comfortable Practicing Against Men: Questions Players Safety
Until now, the former Stanford Cardinal star, who was drafted in the top 10 of the 2024 WNBA Draft and was having a great season before tearing her ACL, shot back at the idea of having to practice against men.
“I guess my confession is I’m really icked out by the potential new practice players,” Brink said on her Straight to Cam podcast alongside her co-host Sydel Curry-Lee, the sister of Golden State Warriors star Stephen Curry.
“It’s basically just a flyer, it’s like me, Dearica [Hamby], Rickea [Jackson], and Kelsey [Plum], and it’s like ‘male practice players wanted’… And all the comments are like ‘Let Cameron Brink back me down’, or something about Rickea or something about Kelsey,” she added when Curry-Lee said she was unaware of the flyer.
The Los Angeles Sparks previously welcomed male players from USC into their gym, but now it appears they are recruiting from all over the world. One would assume whatever former college or high school athletes the Sparks hired for the task would be thoroughly vetted. The organization has a plan on how this can help elevate their team and player safety is most likely the top priority in such an endeavor.
“They need to go through heavy HR training,” Curry-Lee responded.
But Brink is not too sure.
In addition to the potential for women to feel uncomfortable, says Brink, “Who are we trusting coming into this gym?”
She added: “I’m not boxing anyone out. Lynne [Roberts], our new head coach, she’s going to be screaming at me for not rebounding. But I’m not boxing out anyone.”
Camron Brink Doesn’t Seem To Think Male Practice Players Can Be Professional: Fear Fueled By Social Media Posts
Brink’s fears kind of played into the chauvinistic tweets that followed the announcement of the tryouts.
“This is a really bad idea. Alotta D2/D3 guys and even some studs are going to show up and embarrass them. This only has negative implications for a sport trying to take off,” said one fan on X.
“WNBA about to be filled with a bunch of dudes who weren’t good enough for the NBA,” said another fan.
“This the best thing they can do to get their ratings up,” said another male fan.
Cameron Brink Is On The Road To Recovery After ACL Tear Rookie Season
Brink has made a fast recovery since going down just 15 games into her rookie season, just as her game was heating up. The multi-talented player, who is very close to the Curry family, doesn’t seem to have any interest in going up against male players.
Some would say it’s not that serious and it’s a professional business setting. Brink, however, is taking it there, and maybe some of her other teammates feel the same.
