{"id":109019,"date":"2025-08-01T01:37:09","date_gmt":"2025-08-01T01:37:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/109019\/"},"modified":"2025-08-01T01:37:09","modified_gmt":"2025-08-01T01:37:09","slug":"mercury-guard-not-brought-back-after-seven-day-contract","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/109019\/","title":{"rendered":"Mercury Guard Not Brought Back After Seven-Day Contract"},"content":{"rendered":"

Former Phoenix Mercury guard Kiana Williams’s second seven-day contract<\/a> has expired and the team has opted to not bring her back on another deal for now. Williams filled in some valuable minutes for a Phoenix team that was besieged by midseason injuries, averaging 11 minutes a night with 50% shooting from the field and solid 35.7% shooting from three. <\/p>\n

She scored a career-high 17 points in a blowout win over the Dallas Wings on July 7th. But the Mercury have opted to leave her off the roster for now. <\/p>\n

According to a post on X from Desert Wave Media<\/a>, the Mercury have opted to leave her off the team to maintain financial flexibility for the WNBA trade deadline, which is coming up on Thursday, August 7th, at 3:00 p.m. EST. While the Mercury, who have the league’s third-best record and a rotation full of positive contributors, may not appear to be a team in major need of a trade deadline move, it’s possible that the team’s recent play, with them losing four of their last five<\/a>, could push the front office to make some tweaks. <\/p>\n

It’s unlikely the Mercury will make a push for an earth-shattering trade for a superstar — their starting lineup already features two 2025 All-Stars and a former Finals MVP in Satou Sabally, Alyssa Thomas, and Kahleah Copper — it’s possible the Mercury could swing a deal to acquire another big with size (no Mercury starter is taller than 6’4″) or another guard who can create for herself and others. <\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Jun 6, 2025; Uncasville, Connecticut, USA; Connecticut Sun guard Marina Mabrey (3) shoots the ball against Atlanta Dream center Brittney Griner (42) in the second half at Mohegan Sun Arena. Mandatory Credit: David Butler II-Imagn Images \/ David Butler II-Imagn Images<\/p>\n

Yahoo Sports has pitched the idea of a trade for Marina Mabrey<\/a>, in exchange for starting center Natasha Mack, reserve guard Lexi Held, and up to two second-round picks, but it is a little hard to imagine Mack being traded right after being elevated into the starting lineup. <\/p>\n

Still, there’s size elsewhere in the lineup (Kalani Brown, not currently in the rotation, is 6’7″) and as good as Held has been, Mabrey is a bigger talent, a player who scored just under 15 points a night last year while shooting an excellent 42.4% from deep. Mabrey can also provide some extra playmaking to help take pressure off of Thomas, who leads the team in assists by a considerable margin (they also have experience playing together in Connecticut). <\/p>\n

There’s no way to be sure just what the front office has planned over the next week, but Williams not being re-signed seems to indicate that some sort of personnel change is on the way, with the team hoping to put themselves in a position to compete for a title. <\/p>\n

For more on the Mercury, be sure to check our Facebook<\/a> and X<\/a> pages. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Former Phoenix Mercury guard Kiana Williams’s second seven-day contract has expired and the team has opted to not…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":109020,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[62,67,132,68,232],"class_list":{"0":"post-109019","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wnba","8":"tag-sports","9":"tag-united-states","10":"tag-unitedstates","11":"tag-us","12":"tag-wnba"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114950953122808356","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109019","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=109019"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109019\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/109020"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=109019"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=109019"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=109019"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}