WNBA: Brittney Griner Set to Join Atlanta After 11 Seasons with Phoenix

By Leobert Julian A. de la Peña

After the Kelsey Plum trade saga, another off-season negotiation stunned the Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA) on January 29, 2025.

Brittney Griner, the defensive superstar who spent her first 11 WNBA seasons playing for the Phoenix Mercury, reportedly agreed to a deal to send her to the Atlanta Dream.

ESPN’s Shams Charania confirmed the news, announcing that Griner will sign a one-year deal with Atlanta after entering the WNBA free agency.

Since getting drafted by Phoenix during the 2013 WNBA Rookie draft ceremony, Griner immediately became the franchise’s heart and soul after providing the much-needed grit and grind mentality.

The defensive center was a three-time Olympic basketball gold medalist and was named to the WNBA All-Star selection eight times.

A year after landing in Phoenix, Griner helped the franchise clinch a WNBA championship while also winning the 2014 Defensive Player of the Year award.

She was hailed as the league’s scoring champion in 2017 and 2019, and was also the WNBA’s leader in blocks from 2013-2021.

However, Griner’s basketball career took a hit when she was convicted of drug smuggling last 2022 by the Russian government.

The decision came after the American basketball player was arrested at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo airport last February 17, 2022.

Russian authorities found out that Griner possessed less than a gram of cannabis oil stocked in vape cartridges upon landing at the said airport.

However, Griner eventually returned to the US after five months of imprisonment on Russian soil when former president Joe Biden arranged a deal that finalized a prisoner swap, in exchange for Russian citizen Viktor Bout.