Soft Power

Editorial

Title: Soft Power
Subtitle: A Speculative Thought About Basketball, Ego, and the Unwritten Code
Series: Under the “You Left Her There” Umbrella

What if the silence that followed Angel Reese being shoved to the floor wasn’t submission?

When it happened in the Fever-Sky season opener—and the crowd cheered—it felt like something broke. Not just skin against hardwood, but spirit. And when the league, the refs, and the media said “move on,” what they really meant was: swallow it.

But what if that silence was strategy?

We’ve seen this before. Kobe Bryant once iced out his own teammates to send a message. LeBron James disengaged during losses to make the front office sweat. Diana Taurasi? She skipped the WNBA entirely and went overseas when the league didn’t get it right. These weren’t meltdowns. They were controlled burns. Power plays executed with calm precision.

The WNBA built a superteam around Caitlin Clark. The Sky dismantled one around Angel Reese. They fired Teresa Weatherspoon—her trusted coach—and hired a rookie, Tyler Marsh, who appears more figurehead than tactician. GM Jeff Pagliocca  — who didn’t draft Angel — seems to be running the show. The leadership isn’t building around her. They’re boxing her in.

Now the Sky are 0–2, with double-digit losses, no rhythm, and visible dysfunction. And Angel?

She’s playing through it. Quietly. With restraint.

Some say she looks lost. Others say broken. But maybe she’s neither. Maybe what we’re seeing is soft power: the ability to resist by not giving them what they want.

Maybe she’s letting the system collapse under its own weight.

And maybe, when the moment is right, she won’t raise her voice. She’ll raise the standard.

Copyright © 2025 E Maria Shelton Speller

 

This editorial is a speculative opinion piece. All claims are based on publicly available information and do not assert personal intent. It is published for commentary, analysis, and discourse.