One of the more interesting points about women’s sports is that it is never unusual for an athlete to become pregnant and take a year off from her sport to take care of her child. It is a fascinating point and it is one that has directly impacted the Tulsa Shock of the WNBA in the 2015 season.
Glory Johnson has been named an All-Star in the last two years with the Shock. She has an average of 14.7 points per game in her career and has been a popular figure among fans of the Shock for a while. However, she recently announced that she is pregnant and that she will miss the 2015 season.
This is clearly a tough announcement for the Shock as the team is hoping to try and get back into the playoffs. The Shock went 12-22 last season and failed to reach the playoffs.
The Shock had 25-1 odds to win the WNBA title at the start of the season. This is due to the team’s relative inexperience.
Still, the Shock have a few young players that should potentially give the team a bit of a chance to at least reach the playoffs. Amanda Zahui B. was drafted from Minnesota as the second overall pick in the recent draft.
The Shock has one rising star in former Notre Dame standout Skylar Diggins. An All-Star from last year, Diggins was the league’s most improved player last year and got about twenty points per game last season. Odyssey Sims, who became a popular player in her first year out of Baylor, should also contribute to the Shock.
This is an interesting development in the WNBA but the team will certainly be looking to keep these changes from being too much of a threat. It should be interesting to see how the Tulsa Shock plays this year while trying to keep such a big distraction from Glory Johnson from being all that much of a problem.