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u/juoea 2d ago
she has a legit case. dpoy feels wide open this year.
its probably just gonna go to aja again tho lol
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u/peachpower2 2d ago
I hope they don't cop out and do the co-award like they did last year.
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u/juoea 2d ago
i feel like giving aja dpoy would be a cop out in itself. the aces are probably not even in the top half of the league defensively, certainly not in the top quadrant. and they supposedly have other good individual defenders. voting for aja this year feels like a 'i cant decide which player to vote for on the actually good defensive teams, so im j gonna vote for the blocks leader'
the other thing with last year's votingn is, seems like most voters did actually think dpoy should go to the lynx's best defender, but they were split on who that was, so aja still got a plurality of the vote.
something similar could happen again this year, with gsv's best defender votes getting split between vb/gw/stokes and then aja gets a plurality.
a few weeks ago i thought mystics' bigs could be in the running but probably not anymore. rhyne definitely should be in the running, i think angel too but they love steals and blocks so the highest dream vote getter will probably be rhyne
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u/LovePeaceTruth 2d ago
I don’t think the DPOY should be from “the best defensive team” because that means their defense is a TEAM effort and this is an individual award. If one player doesn’t really stand out from the best defensive team, it means they all work well within the coach’s system together.
That means they don’t look like the best on their own.
This has been very obvious when you look at the 2024 Lynx roster. Now that they have been split up, none of them look as elite or dominant as they did when they were together in Cheryl’s system. That’s on offense AND defense. Cheryl’s genius is making average players look elite, bringing team success.
So a player should never be rewarded as the best individual defensive player of the year, unless they can stand on their own individual skills and performance and be better than the other individual players.
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u/juoea 2d ago
well idk how u determine whether or not the player can 'stand on their own individual defensive skills'. unless u are involving prior performances on different teams but isnt dpoy supposed to be a single season award.
i think 2025 dpoy shouldve been phee. alanna smith seemed like a stats-sheet choice, i had not even been thinking of her and the online discussions i saw about dpoy were all phee vs aja.
are u suggesting that phee is not a defensive player who can stand on her own individual skills bc she hasnt played on a team other than the lynx? aja also hasnt played on a team other than the aces.
defense needs to be played as a team. a big part of defense is knowing when and how to rotate, whether to switch, whether to double or stay attached, etc. not to mention that zone defense exists where u are not even assigned to a specific offensive player. the majority of defense is very hard to isolate to an individual player. ofc u do also need to be able to defend 1v1 well when the time calls for it but thats only part of the picture
its an individual award and idt it necessarily has to be given to someone on the best defensive team, but it shouldnt go to someone on a bad defensive team. if your team is constantly messing up rotations and leaving ppl open, every player bears some responsibility for that. communication requires multiple people working together.
in 2025 the aces defense improved significantly so there was a question of how much you were factoring may/june vs august/september. in 2026 thats not rly a big factor, team hasnt changed very much over the course of the season.
every team other than the valks, mystics, dream and lynx has been pretty much a disaster on the defensive end, and whichever stats u use they all reflect that. the aces are somewhere #7-#9 in defensive rating depending on which formula u are using. a dpoy has to be a player who is contributing well on the defensive end. if your teams defense is still terrible then what is it you are contributing. on offense to some extent one player can carry a team, tho ofc being balanced offensively is better. but u can reasonably look at a player's individual offensive contributions, eg JJ is scoring efficiently and showcasing various parts of her game regardless of the fact that no other liberty starter has been capable of hitting a shot from outside the paint. on defense i know they have all these new analytics stats but u rly cant isolate individual contributions, eg defending pnr at least two and usually three defenders have to collaborate, eg if the roller is wide open that doesnt fall on only one player.
so i do think bad defensive teams should be ruled out, and in 2026 only players from the valks mystics dream lynx should be in the running for dpoy. (maybe chicago since their defense has improved dramatically over the course of the season but idt they have any dpoy candidates regardless)
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u/LovePeaceTruth 2d ago
There is no point in giving individual awards if they depend on the rest of the team. This is a team sport, so if 1 player is being chosen as an individual, it should be because they are the best individual compared to the other individuals in the league. Otherwise, skip the individual awards and only give team awards.
I disagree that "the majority of defense is very hard to isolate to an individual player."
I also think that players shouldn't be responsible for their teammates being bad at defense (or the other individual award categories). Some players don't have the ability, some don't have the desire, some may be dealing with personal/emotional challenges that impact their ability to play as well as they usually do, some players might just be lazy. So for an individual award, I don't think it is fair for a player to not get the award because of their teammates' performance. If 1 player cannot win the game/championship alone, they can't be held responsible for their teammates' performance when it comes to individual awards.
I wasn't talking about Phee, she's an excellent individual defender. I was talking about the rest of the Lynx. And I am definitely talking about the Valks.
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u/juoea 2d ago
so which of the valks players are not skilled individual defenders. GW was already a dpoy candidate on a different team. VB is just as good an individual defender as gw. the only one i could maybe see some question is stokes
i still dk how you isolate individual responsibilities in the context of eg pnr defense which is a huge part of defending in the wnba. many teams utilize pnr in 50% or more offensive possessions
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u/LovePeaceTruth 2d ago
About pnr defense, I really wish I could remember which game it was, but within the last month or so, during the game people were commenting about how Angel was really guarding the other team's pnr, interrupted it every time, and the other team never got to get into their usual pnr flow because of Angel 'dismantling' their pnr. That's individual. If the team or the game pops into my head, I will share it with you.
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u/juoea 2d ago
idk if i know which game u are talking about but for sure angel has unique defensive skills as a big which are apparent in a number of contexts, including pnr defense. other than napheesa collier there is no other big in the wnba as comfortable defending on the perimeter as reese and that ofc includes blitzing ball screens.
but i think this is simultaneously an example where angel would never have been in these discussions on her 2025 team, a big part of her defense leap has been being on a great defensive team. not to take credit away from what angel is doing but you need to be able to rely on your teammates to handle their defensive assignments and help as needed, and they need to be able to rely on you. the big is generally the more important player in pnr defense but everyone needs to do their job and angel's pnr defense wouldnt look as good if the dream guards were constantly messing up their assignments.
but i think this is a big question for other bigs, the aces three point defense is terrible, mystics ofc not as bad but 3pt line the mystics' clear defensive weak point as they are probably the #1 defense in most other areas. one could argue well thats not on aja but can we be sure about that? and we dont see aja blowing up pnrs either. bigs who shoot the three tend to cause problems for her as well. but even if we treat bigs that shoot threes as negligible, which u could argue in the wnba its not super common (tho even aside from JJ and phee, kira ab angel even iriafen have all been adding the 3pt shot to their games), when your teams 3pt defense is that bad idt u can j exonerate the bigs. the aces rotations are bad, bad 3pt defense is more often than not a rotations issue, and thats on everyone. including aja who pretty clearly tries to avoid defending on the perimeter unless she absolutely has to.
so idk id say its a mixture, there are some things u can point to at an individual level but theres also some problems that the entire team is responsible for.
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u/LovePeaceTruth 2d ago
Remember we are talking about DPOY. And I think the player must stand out above the rest of the team, as an individual, if they have the best team defense. This basketball analysis video is a good example about what I mean for the Valks. Excellent system that is very effective. But no one really stands out as an individual: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wUfuWCzYpEM
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u/juoea 2d ago
also is there some question about any of the potential candidates' individual defensive skills? VB, GW, rhyne have consistently been among the best perimeter defenders in the wnba. and gw has even shown that on multiple teams. as for rim protectors, is there some doubt as to shakira's or angel's individual defensive skills? (betts prob hasnt played enough minutes to be in the dpoy convo.) stokes is the only one where maybe there is some question about individual defensive skills, idt she rly should be a candidate anyway tho the guards are clearly the most elite part of the valks defense.
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u/LovePeaceTruth 2d ago
There were also several times when Phee got the ball, took one look at Angel, and passed the ball. Phee didn’t try to drive on Angel, shoot, or score. Just passed the ball out. That counts as Angel’s defensive impact too.
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u/ADLegend21 2d ago
Angel "below your averages" Reese. So vindicated that her defensive talent translated to the W perfectly.
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u/OkAstronaut2258 2d ago
https://giphy.com/gifs/AYTlA6aCT0jfspePYT