The 2024 WNBA Draft Was Weirdly Normal
Monday's first round went largely according to what the mock drafts suggested.
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This was supposed to be a column about the biggest surprises of the WNBA Draft. It was supposed to focus on the thing that usually happens in the draft, which is teams making some out-of-left-field picks in the first round.
That didn’t happen, though. Instead, we got a very normal first round. The first eight picks went off the board in roughly the same order they were expected to go off the board based on mock drafts. Across The Timeline calculated an average of several mock drafts, and you can see here that the mocks fared very well:
The site’s data on mock drafts only goes back to 2023, but you can still see a little more variety last year. Six of the top eight players in the composite rankings went in the top eight, with No. 4 Jordan Horston falling to ninth and No. 8 Brea Beal to No. 24. We didn’t see those kinds of slides at the top of this class.
Really, the only big first-round surprise was the Liberty taking Marquesha Davis at No. 11 when she was 19th in the mock draft composite. While that wasn’t the anticipated pick, it also wasn’t the wildest thing. Davis is an athletic wing who can find her shot. She doesn’t have too much of a game from deep, but she can hit midrange shots and drive to the basket.
The relative chalkiness of this draft speaks to how certain players have established themselves in clear tiers. Caitlin Clark was the obvious best player in the class and went No. 1. Cameron Brink was the obvious No. 2 and went second. Kamilla Cardoso and Rickea Jackson felt interchangeable in terms of who was the third and who was the fourth-best prospect, so it makes sense that they swapped positions from the composite average to the real draft.
Carla Leite and Leila Lacan were both top 10 picks after being 16th and 14th, respectively, in the composite, but to me that speaks to how some writers who put mocks together didn’t have a great sense of what international players could do. The two each appeared in just eight of the 19 mocks in the Across The Timeline database. Of the mocks they were in, both were top 10 picks in half the mocks. There might have been a little surprise there, but this wasn’t like Kysre Gondrezick being a lottery pick in 2022 after — as best I can remember — never appearing that high in any mocks.
So, that might be the biggest takeaway from Monday night. The first round was fairly predictable. Dallas needed to take a stash pick at nine to make its roster work. Connecticut and Atlanta probably needed to prioritize roster space as well and both took international players who won’t come over in 2024. Everyone assumed that the Sky traded up to draft Angel Reese at No. 7, which turned out to be true.
Still, we did have some surprises later on, so let’s take a look at some other takeaways from the 2024 WNBA Draft.
Caitlin Clark’s coronation
It was the worst-kept secret in sports. From the moment Caitlin Clark declared for the WNBA Draft in late February, everyone knew that she was trading in the cornfields of Iowa for the speedways of Indiana, especially with the Fever teasing the importance of the No. 22 so much, like when they made a huge deal of posting that it was 22 days until the draft.
There’s a lot that can be said about Clark, the all-time leading scorer in NCAA history. She has a chance to go down as one of the greatest players in league history if her otherworldly shooting range translates to the pros. She’s also an elite playmaker who’s going to thrive in Indiana, where she’ll be able to set Aliyah Boston and NaLyssa Smith up in great spots. There are some concerns about her defense, but she was serviceable on that end during the NCAA Tournament. If Clark can simply just not be a liability on the defensive end, she’s a future league MVP.
She also has a chance to really shift the economic future of the Fever. The team has been near the bottom of the league in attendance over the past few seasons, but it’s safe to say that Clark’s presence will change that.
The Sparks have the basis for the rebuild
With Nneka Ogwumike gone, the Sparks are finally positioned for a real rebuild. Los Angeles has missed the playoffs in three consecutive seasons, the longest streak in franchise history. That streak likely extends to four seasons when all is said and done this year, but there’s some direction now for the team after it added Cameron Brink and Rickea Jackson on Monday night.
Brink was the clear-cut No. 2 player in this class, someone whom I view as closer to Clark than she is to the rest of the class. She’s an elite rim defender, finishing in the top 15 in blocks per game in each of her collegiate seasons, including leading the nation at 3.7 per game this past season. She had some foul issues at Stanford, but if she can work that out, she’ll anchor the paint for the Sparks for a long time. Offensively, Brink ranked in the 93rd percentile among forwards in true shooting percentage this season and the 99th percentile in assist percentage. She has the tools to make defenses pay when she’s left open from deep, but even if the three-point game doesn’t develop, her passing and her ability to score inside make her a problem. She shot 68.0% at the rim this season, which ranked in the 87th percentile.
As for Jackson, her path to WNBA stardom is a little more speculative. This was a draft without a lot of wing talent, so the Sparks grabbing the best wing at four makes sense. Jackson’s an exceptionally talented player who can create her own shot, though she takes a concerning amount of long twos:
It’s especially concerning because she shot just 29.6% on those mid-range twos this past season, which ranks in the 43rd percentile. But if Jackson can clean up the shot selection, she has a chance to really shine. She ranked in the 92nd percentile in field-goal percentage at the rim and shot a solid 33.8% from three.
Brynna Maxwell, Kate Martin headline second-round surprises
Maybe the Chicago Sky were thinking ‘alright, we need to throw a curveball’ when the second round began, because Gonzaga’s Brynna Maxwell wasn’t on anyone’s board. I almost mean that literally, as the only mock draft she was even on was Michael Voepel’s over at ESPN, and he had her 30th.
Maxwell is a lights out shooter from deep, connecting on 44.0% of her threes last season. In the 2022-23 season, she knocked down 48.1%, which ranked eighth in the country. She did so on 5.5 attempts per game, more than any player who finished ahead of her in percentage.
Then there was Kate Martin. She appeared on four mocks, but wasn’t higher than No. 27 on any of them. The Las Vegas Aces took her 18th overall. Martin can knock down shots and was a great glue piece for the Hawkeyes, but there were questions about her pro potential because of her size and athleticism. She does a lot of things well, but does she do enough things at a high level? This is where the W having just 12 teams is an issue — in a larger league, a glue player like Martin definitely would carve out a role, but it’s so tough in a league that’s this competitive.
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What is interesting about the Kate Martin pick is that, IMO, she's more likely to make the team instead of Dyaisha Fair, especially if there is only roster spot available. Fair can score, and for Syracuse they needed every point, but I believe Martin would be more efficient in a team environment. I also think Dallas drafting Jacy Sheldon puts Crystal Dangerfield at risk - and she may have to move teams.