Nine years as president of the WNBA players\u2019 union has made Nneka Ogwumike a savvy politician, and like any savvy politician, she knows how to read the room. After a brutal late-game loss to the Sparks on Monday night, she and her Seattle Storm teammate Skylar Diggins sat beside each other at the postgame press conference. Ogwumike was her usual self\u2014mellow, introspective\u2014and she knew this was a night for her to do all the talking. Diggins was pissed. \u201cFor Skylar, do you feel like you guys\u2026\u201d one reporter began, before quickly changing course. \u201cOr Nneka,\u201d he offered, as his initial target\u2019s frown deepened. When the press conference ended, Diggins left having not said a word for all four minutes, her arms still crossed as she got up from the table and exited the room.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\u201cSkylar is such a cry baby\u00a0\ud83d\ude02\u00a0\ud83d\ude02\u00a0\ud83d\ude02\u00a0\ud83d\ude02\u00a0\u2026I guess that’s what you get for mocking the linx dance\u00a0\ud83d\ude02\u00a0\ud83d\ude02\u00a0\ud83d\ude02\u00a0\ud83d\ude02,\u201d one uncharitable (and spelling-challenged) commenter wrote on the press conference recording uploaded to YouTube. The\u00a0“linx\u00a0dance” would be the Electric Slide, which the Minnesota Lynx do together after every home win<\/a>. Last week, after a similarly brutal late-game loss to the Storm, the Lynx were on the receiving end of the dance. Diggins scored 19 points in the second half to get Seattle the win. Victorious, she grapevined and clapped with Storm guard Erica Wheeler on her way off the floor.\u00a0Before she walked through the tunnel<\/a>, Diggins did the dance again.<\/p>\n These are the highs and lows of Skylar Diggins, a thrilling player in either state. She\u2019s spent the last two seasons on a Storm team that seems to take after its 5-foot-9 point guard: They\u2019re enigmatic, unpredictable, fun and sometimes very funny. Since the start of July, Seattle has developed a reputation for wild swings. They\u2019ll beat the best team in the league on their home court and then immediately drop a game to a non-playoff team. They\u2019ll play the finest quarter of basketball ever right before playing the worst. They relish being the villain, subverting expectations; their record is actually better on the road. \u201cI think if you ask some of my peers,\u201d Diggins told\u00a0Vanity Fair\u00a0in an interview<\/a> this season, \u201cthey might categorize me as a bit of a gremlin.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n The Storm have just two games left in the regular season, games that will determine whether and where they\u2019re headed for the first round of the WNBA playoffs. But I didn\u2019t want the season to end before saluting the league\u2019s most entertaining gremlin, its No. 1 crashout queen.\u00a0<\/p>\n In the second half of the summer, Diggins hasn\u2019t been quite the dynamo she was in the first half, when she seemed like a lock to nab one of the All-WNBA guard spots. But she\u2019s still enjoyed an excellent 2025, averaging assist numbers among the highest of her career and logging her first WNBA triple-double in a July game against the Sun. If she was totally silent during that Sparks press conference, it wasn’t because of poor performance: She finished with a team-high 21 points on 8-of-16 shooting and six assists.<\/p>\n As Diggins matured as a pro, she became a more-than-serviceable defender, stabbing her hands at other guards’ handles to get the ball moving the other way. The same intensity shows up on offense. Her signature trait as a scorer is still her gift for getting downhill. Diggins drives to the basket with a sort of lunatic self-confidence, operating under the assumption that whatever she’s going to do will probably work out. It makes for great basketball; the chance to witness someone so full of belief in herself is also something like the whole reason people watch sports in the first place.<\/p>\n And sure, the more confidence a star has, the more wounded she’ll be when she has to show up for a presser after a loss. But I wouldn\u2019t want Skylar Diggins acting any other way. Let her be confident enough to block 6-foot-7 Kamilla Cardoso …<\/p>\n … declare that her Unrivaled team has been \u201ccarrying this league since Day 1.\u201d<\/p>\n … tell a crowd in Chicago to sit their asses down.<\/p>\n … and jaw at the Lynx bench.<\/p>\n In that Vanity Fair interview, Diggins spoke about the trials of her career. Before signing with Seattle, she played for the Phoenix Mercury, where she butted heads with her head coach<\/a> and famously got into a fight with Diana Taurasi on the bench. Brittney Griner\u2019s detainment<\/a>, she added, also hit her hard. Her relationship with the team ended acrimoniously while she was out after giving birth to her second child; she struggled with postpartum depression after the birth of her first child and had other complications during this pregnancy. \u201cThere were new coaches, no one contacted me, they wouldn\u2019t let me park in the parking lot anymore,\u201d Diggins said.<\/p>\n