Okay, I'll start.
Probably the most important thing to understand about me is that I grew up an all around sports nut. I learned to read using the sports page and basically followed everything I could from it. Doesn't mean I'm a long-time women's basketball expert - very hard to get information on the women's game pre-WNBA - but I remember Cheryl Miller's USC Trojans even if I can't claim to have been able to understand the inner workings.
Fundamentally, I've always thought it bizarre the way men tend to look down on women's basketball as if it's "not really basketball". To me if you love basketball, you can enjoy watching basketball at levels much lower than the NBA because the fundamentals of the sport are the same - dribbling, passing, shooting, running, etc, all in an open field space which requires field vision and awareness from the participants. The idea that the really important factor is how high the players can jump just seems silly to me. I mean, I love aerial plays like the next guy, but the vast majority of the time and play of NBA games is spent doing stuff that doesn't make the dunk highlights, so if all you like are the dunks, to me you don't get to have any kind of cred high ground.
With the beginning of the WNBA, I couldn't help but be fascinated by Miller's former teammate Cynthia Cooper coming back from Europe and dominating the league to the shock of absolutely everyone in women's basketball. Turns out, 3's are a big deal.
With the '00s, the player I was fascinated with was the great Aussie Lauren Jackson who I have to acknowledge I had a bit of a crush on, as unfair as that it is to mention as the first thing when we're talking about such a great basketball talent.
After Jackson I have to acknowledge that I didn't pay as close attention to the WNBA for a good while. In recent years, driven in part by the superior stats that now exist for the WNBA, I've become a proselytizer of the greatness of Maya Moore. I knew she was great from her time at UConn all the way through, but I didn't expect the way she popped out with an impact dominance that really hadn't been seen before in the 21st century.
Looking forward to talking more about these greats as we find our groove with this board.