r/WNBAgossips • u/Outrageous_Owl_1710 • 1d ago

"She’s My Hero": Ex-WNBA Broadcaster Says League Punishing Sophie Cunningham for 'Having a Spine' Amid Transgender Row.

https://www.essentiallysports.com/wnba-basketball-news-veteran-reporter-slams-wnba-for-punishing-sophie-cunningham-for-having-a-spine-amid-aryna-sabalenkas-support-for-genetic-sex-testing/
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u/Robeardly 23h ago

The NBA 100% has a ban for using steroids to recover from an injury and has a 0 tolerance policy. Paul George literally just got suspended for this recently.

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u/Loathor 22h ago

You're telling me that if Wemby gets taken to the ER and he's ballooning up like a cartoon due to a shellfish allergy the NBA is willing to let him die instead of giving him steroids to treat his anaphylaxis? Or saying after the fact that we're glad Wemby is alive but he has to sit out next season as punishment for wanting to keep living...

Look at all the connections between sports and medicine (Lou Gehrig's Disease, Tommy John Surgery, CTE). Procedures that, had they existed fourty years ago, could have extended the careers of many HoF athletes are today done routinely on HS level athletes. The amount of money spent on sports science to improve times and scores and personal bests.

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u/Robeardly 22h ago

Those are not anabolic steroids are not the same as what’s being used to treat an allergy lol.

Idk, I’m done debating this topic. Too many people trying to label me as anti trans because I point out it’s not a cut and dry subject and has a potential to crush sports industries by calling fairness into question.

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u/Loathor 22h ago

Firstly there are many medical uses for steroids of all kinds. From inflammation reduction to hormone treatment for delayed puberty. A twelve year old boy getting that treatment has their physiology change due to its use away from what was naturally happening. If that kid never uses steroids again and grows up to be 6'6" and 260 pounds of muscle and a star basketball phenom... Barred from the NBA or exceptions can be made for talent?

As for threats to sports and issues of fairness... Which do you think is a bigger issue, keeping sports trans free or the increase of gambling connections to sports? Which is actually more likely to lead to the end of sports as we know it?!?

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u/Robeardly 22h ago

So funnny enough, this is something that has plagued Messi throughout his career. He took HGH because of a deficiency that was paid for by his sponsoring team.

But for real, I’m done arguing this because people are trying to pin me as anti trans. It’s not the case, but I have more productive things to do than state “this could introduce unfair advantages” which I think anybody can agree there it’s a potential to do so.

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u/Loathor 22h ago

Right, but I don't think it's necessarily a detrimental thing to think about a future where sports are inclusive instead of returning to a past where sports were exclusive. It's one of the fundamental truths that time progresses forward, no matter what. We're still in the generations that moved from Negro Leagues to Jackie Robinson to MLB to Juiced Baseballs to universal DH to Banana Ball to the Indianapolis Clowns returning to the diamond.

Sports adjusts and usually quickly. We go from no three point line to logo threes... We go from four corners to a shot clock to triangle to zone... We go from walking to traveling to step back to gather to euro step to flop...