The Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz - Good Follow - Our WNBA All-Star Ballots: Who made the cut?

Episode Date: June 26, 2025

Ros, Logan, and Meadowlark Media’s Juju Gotti react to the All-Star voting first returns and reveal their own All-Star ballots. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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or go to volvocars.ca for full details. You're listening to Draft Kings Network. Hey, what's up everyone? I'm in a great mood. Hey, what's up, everyone? I'm in a great mood. Welcome to Good Follow Show presented by DraftKings. It's me, your girl, Roz Goldilmute. And who are you, young lady?

I am Logan Hackett. But first, Roz, when you're doing your little dancey dance, I have to say your nails look phenomenal. Oh, per, oh, oh, period. Thank you so much for noticing. Oh, my gosh. I'm in a new era in my life. I am in my nail girly journey era.

I was such a boring girl who just played ball and like never did my nails. And now I'm like doing designs and all the things. And now I talk like this and I'm giving Fiesta right now. Okay, these nails say Fiesta to me. And the reason why it's a Fiesta and it's a party is because we're so excited to have a guest joining us on the show today. Friend to the show, Metal Arc family. You know him from all the shows on Dan LeBattard and Allie Oop, our guy Juju. Hey, what's up Juju?

Don't I be with you a good follow up, serving everybody. What's up y'all? Happy to be back. I'm proud of you. Thank y'all for having me back, man. It's such a fun place to be. Where in the world, where else would I rather be?

Nowhere. Oh, maybe a France with Logan. No place I'd rather be. Hey. Da da da da. All right. Do you guys not know that one? Is that a?

I was with that one. I'm here to support. Yeah, I'm here to support. My song, my song collection is more of the ghetto dialect. So I don't think that's. We're a show of lots of diversity of palates of taste here at Good Follow. Speaking of palates of taste, I got a menu for you. This is an all star WBA all star voting show.

The first returns are in. We're going to have some observations of that. And then for fun, guys around sometime by the time you watch this in like a day or so, voting is over So juju Logan and myself we're gonna build our all-star ballots. I Just want to tap my own shoulder. Maybe this one. Yeah, because your girl Represents good follow good follow has a media vote. Well, not good fall I have a media vote, but I represent for good follow in the all star game. So, um, I am very, I take it as a great honor and we'll discuss Logan.

You need a crown for that one. Huge honor, but y'all just remind everyone, the crown can be yours when you tune into our new episodes that now drop twice a week, one on Tuesday, one on Thursday. You can watch on YouTube or wherever else you get your podcasts, but y'all, are you ready to get into it? We are having some good vibes today. I know. And I you are being such a good sport, like anything we throw at you. She's like, yes, and the crown can be yours. Segway, Segway, Segway.

You're doing great, sweetie. Go on, Logan. Thank you. Well, you know, who else is doing great is all the people doing the all star voting, because I'm pretty sure there's record numbers. I've seen it all over my social and it's only open for a few more days. Now, if you don't know fan votes account for 50% of the vote, whereas current players and media panel, Raw's account for 25% each. So last Friday, the first returns for fan voting came out and there's been a lot of discourse about

the results. But y'all, what do you think about the current top 10 standings based on the fan votes? I mean, look, salute to my sister, Caitlin Clark. But you can tell the Caitlin Clark effect is echoing throughout the fever. I'm looking at I'm looking at a first name and a last name right now that I would have never thought would be up there. Nope. Who, who, who, who? The first name start with an L,

last name end with a ho, because salute to my sister, but goodness gracious alive. Respect for Lexi Ho, respect, respect. She tough, tough as nails, trace, le chase. But at the same time, wow. Yeah, you almost got to shout out the Fever fan base, you know, because at least they're super active and engaged, four players in the top 10. But for me, what stands out, what we don't have shown on the graphic is the numbers of

voting participation increasing, honestly honestly since the last season and a rising tide lifts all ships I mean it's around Caitlin Clark so the Caitlin Clark effect is real and the league is still growing so before the 2023 season the top vote-getter was Asia Wilson with guess how many votes like just give me a ballpark range. Guess 10 to 1,000 or hundreds of thousands. 4,000. Oh, I was gonna say 40,000. That's ridiculous.

That, Logan. He has no faith. You are, if this was prices, right, Logan, you would've went over. But in 2023, in 2023, the top vote getter was Asia Wilson with 35,968 votes. The next year, Caitlin Clark comes in. The top vote getter is Caitlin Clark with 216,427 votes.

And excuse me, I might be saying this wrong. It's actually after the first round of like votes come in, that early first round. So y'all understand the point I'm trying to make. We went from 40,000 or 36,000 to 200,000 when Caitlin Clark came in. And maybe what's more important to me is that now this season in 2025,

the first round of returns has Caitlin at way higher than 200 something. She's at five hundred fifteen thousand, which shows so much growth. We're talking about half a million votes came in for Caitlin Clark. Also, equally impressively is Nafisa Collier at almost five hundred thousand votes. Four hundred eighty four. So like this is it's to say like, yeah, yeah, it is a lot of Caitlin Clark driving this stuff, but it's growing and it's taken everyone.

There's a lot of interest and it's taken everyone with them. I want to know the final number on how many I wonder if we're going to crack a million this year. Well, another thing that I thought was interesting was where Angel Reese was in that voting, because Angel Reese was number 13 and she had pulled in and far this first round of early votes coming in 173,367 votes, which I think is interesting because like it don't make sense. The math ain't math in Angel Reese is the most followed player on social media. Like she's got five million followers on Instagram. And then after that, it's not even close. Like the next one is Caitlin Clark, who's at like 3.5. And then after that, it's like, I think it's, I think it's Sabrina at like one something, but it's not even close. So are her, where's her fan base? Like, I mean, I'm not, let me

not get beat up here, but more importantly, like there's 12 players in front of her. So are her fan, is that fan base not as active and engaged in the moment where it matters most? She got to post an Instagram story with the link. Say, hey guys, photocopy just in case you didn't see it. Right. She can't be too cool. You can't be too cool promoting this and that. And don't forget to promote yourself.

That's what I'd be doing. I promote everybody's stuff except myself. And I feel like my sister falling victim to that, because of course, everybody going to go where she point. But sometimes, you know, she want to point at the podcast a little more than the actual star voting. So salute to her.

Maybe she doesn't want to show like, you know what I mean? But I did just that's just something I found interesting. I was like looking through it and I was like, wait a second. And so that's a correlation I made. I'm not really sure why that's happening, but. Very interesting. We always say jump take on jump my bass is right Well with just a few days of voting left. It is now time for us to make our own votes now Roz actually gets a very special media vote, but just like everyone else we have picked for back court and six front court players

We've also picked who we think the two captains should be. And then we're gonna reveal all of the picks to each other. Sound good? Yes. Okay, let's start with guards. Juju, who do you have in your back court? Alrighty. Here goes nothing.

I got Paige Becker's number one. I got Sabrina Yanezcu. Number two, I got Ryan D. Howard. Number three, and Big Al, Alicia Gray. Number four, don't beat me up. I just knew your ballot was gonna be heavy, biased, and skewing towards the Atlanta tree. Oh, no! You see his jersey!

You see his jersey! This is not biased! Thiswing towards the Atlanta. This is, this is, this is actual factuals. This is no sentient feel of bias. This is my actual allegiance is to the, the, the, the, just the sanctity of the game here. Okay. Okay. Cause you know, I could be, I could be accused of liberty affiliations or affinity for Liberty players because my back court is similar to yours in three spots. So I have I wait, do I have that?

Yes, I have. Oh wait, no, it's not. I'm tripping. Wow. Okay. I just realized you don't even have Caitlin Clark out there. Oh, you're going to see it. I'm loud into the microphone.

It's on me like that. Oh, my goodness. Wait, am I turn away? So your four back court votes doesn't even have Caitlin Clark on it. Is it because she got injured and missed a couple games? What is your reasoning? Did you forget about her? No, I did not forget about her.

My sister plays seven games and she missed five games. Like this is not a very long season. Paige is on there by the way. Hot right now. Thank you Logan, because you have Paige Becker's there who also missed a chunk of the season with of this beginning part of the season with a concussion and And was feeling sick.

Yeah, but when she came back, her team is in 11th place in the league. And you got Caitlin, who's being leaned on for so much that the fever need to do. And yes, and it got beat has the fan vote. Yes, she has the fan vote. That's what I'm saying. I'm not influenced by the fan vote. The fan vote is the fan vote. But this is my actual vote. Yes, she has the fan vote. That's what I'm saying. I'm not influenced by the fan vote. The fan vote is the fan vote.

But this is my actual vote. When Paige got back, guess what? The wings look better when she got back. She got a home, they first home W in front of Gino Ariema when she came back. She making every single game competitive when she came back. When Caitlin came back, of course, she did a wonderful job against your Liberty, but she got spanked against them Valkyrie. She got spanked. They're not necessarily doing what

the folks think she's doing. And she went one for her last 17 19 threes. I'm not saying she isn't deserving to be on the All-Star team. I'm saying the starters, your best ability is your availability. And Pays come out and show how she's so accurate. Her efficiency is just at a little higher clip in my opinion. Okay. First of all, we pushed you into a corner and you swung right back at us, Juju. You had your arguments. This is very much the good luck. Let it be knownfellas, this is a safe space for opinions.

Okay? All right. So that's your starting group for backcourt. Can you show Ross Golden-Budet's starting group? I had some different choices there. So for me, the things that seemed pretty clear for me was Caitlin Clark, Alicia Gray, Sabrina Oneskew. Ryan Howard is one of those like immediate reserve pickups.

Like, you know, she'll be all-star reserve. I didn't think the Dream needed two players there, in my opinion, but where I had my conflict was, is it Skylar Diggins or Paige Beckers, who gets that fourth vote for me for the guard position. And for me, Skye's on a better team. She's averaging 18 points, six assists, two rebounds, one and a half steals, three turnovers and a shooting about 44 percent from three in the field on a better team.

But for me, it's really impressive to me that as a rookie, I didn't even realize Paige was averaging 18 points per game. She's tops in assists. She's tops in assists. She's averaging six assists. She really doesn't make a lot of mistakes, especially again, given how much the ball is in her hand and how much, you know, she's a rookie and her team isn't that good defensively. Paige is I already said this.

Paige was Paige in college was disruptive as a defender. Her length, she gets steel, she gets blocks. She's averaging a block a game, two steals, only turns it over two and a half times. And again, to your point, her efficiency. However, can I hold it against her that her team is just so bad? I don't think that's against Paige.

I actually think it's more impressive that she's continuing to be this good despite what the Dallas Wings are doing. So that was my hard part. I actually have a few days until I have to get my voting at the time of taping this show. So can I get away with just saying Clark, Gray, Yonescu, and then either Smith Becker's

and I'll figure that on my own time. Absolutely not. Make a choice right now. Shame the devil. Woo hoo hoo! It's not like the Storm are sitting at two or three either. You know, they hang around in the middle five. I'm going to give it to Paige.

I love you, Sky. I love you. I love you, too, Sky. And the storm, like you say, storm, the storm are better than their numbers say right now. They just got a big win. Now, Sabrina was out there the other night, but they got a big win against the Liberty. And they really they show up, brother. Gabby Williams. I hope she made the team this year

because they got some stars over there. I absolutely I was on the call for that game. And I made the similar place that Skyla Diggins did for NECA in that like NECA is NECA changed the game for them. She's so efficient. Sky makes so much happen for that team. And they're lacking in depth, but they are very talented veteran. And this year, building in the continuity now, you got them players

playing with each other for two years. I actually think that they have a lot more potential to hit in the storm. I'm really excited for them. And I expect to see both Sky and NECA represent as all-stars in the all-star game. Now, whether they're starters or not is different, but they're certainly all-star players. Like, there's nothing to really discuss about that. Right. Y'all, I'm so sorry we have to wrap this block up, but I want to show mine very quickly. It's

pretty much a mix of like both of y'all's. But I more so went for popularity and play on the court. I more so went for popularity and play on the court. But yeah, I really didn't expect anyone else to do Kelsey Plum, which is why. Yeah. A little West Coast love. Yeah, okay. I love how she plays, especially I shouted out for this once, but I'll say it again, my short queen,

which she's not actually super short, but also shout out to Brittany Sykes, because I wasn't sure if anyone was gonna put her on, but she really has some competition to make this list. Coming up, we reveal our front court votes. We'll be right back. No Frills delivers. Get groceries delivered to your door from No Frills with PC Express. Shop online and get $15 in PC Optimum Points on your first five orders. Shop now at NoFriills.ca. Spring is here and you can now get almost anything you need delivered with Uber Eats.

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Today's episode is presented by DraftKings. DraftKings, the crown is yours. It is now time to reveal the rest of our team. And I want to see who we all went with in the front court. So, Roz, you're up. I want to hear it. All right. All right. And Juju, staying with us. Thank you, Juju, for being on the show. My six front court votes are Nafisa Collier,

Asia Wilson, Breanna Stewart, Alyssa Thomas, Nneka Agumake, and Jonquell Jones. The only one that I think, in my opinion, is controversial here might be Jonquell Jones, only because I think the injury may have hurt her and that she's missed a couple of games here. But given that voting is ending on like the June 28th, when I think of the body of work of what John Qual Jones has done, I think that's worthy of my her position in my front

court ballot. You may be saying, oh, but she only averages I think something like 14 points per game or whatever. She was before she got hurt. She was one of two players averaging a double double was her and Aja Reese. And it's one of those things like you got to watch the games. If you're watching the Liberty, you understand just how important John Kuel Jones is to the Liberty's success.

So those are my six and I'm standing 10 toes down on it. What's up? You know, what's that smell? All right. Is anybody cooking in here? You know, I smell a little home cooking as well. You accused me of with a dream. Yes, John Quell is amazing.

And yes, you conveniently have six people in your front court as well. I don't like it at all. Make a choice. She is out of here if you got to ask me. And I love John Quell. I know how important she is, but that's not what we're doing. We got to get her up out of here. Salute to Jean-Claude Jones. But you like the other ones.

You feel like, you know, Alyssa Thomas is another front court vote where I feel like you really got to be watching the games and understanding all that she does and that she's leading the league in assists, which she's done before. And for the Mercury, she just makes so much happening. Like she just fills that stat sheet.

So, yeah. I mean, where are you at with yours, Juju? Look, I had my biggest problem was it's so many good guards in the league. I was like, let's put slam from Britney Sight. Let's pull her at four because she can play it if she wanted to. Well, yeah, I got S Kiki, Brianna Stewart. I got, of course, you got to know Queen Fee, Asia Wilson. And the same thing you said, bro.

Alyssa Thomas, a tease is a little too important for the Mercury's eventual success because she missed some games. She had an injury. But, bro, they I think what they on like a five, six game win the street right now. She got everybody out there looking crazy. She passed the hit man, Sammy Sam, Sammy Wilkin, Treyball. She passed over here. Hell, the Treyball.

Like, bro, McCall Treyball. So it's like, she's the ultimate facilitator. She makes side two even better. I think that she has to be on this list. But yeah, everyone else deserves it as well. And that's interesting because Satu absolutely is deserving of a front court starter position, too.

I just wondered, do the Mercury get to there? It's I felt that I had to make a choice and I felt that ultimately I went A.T. But Satu absolutely has a discussion around MVP even to be in the conversation the way she been scoring the ball for the Mercury. And she's a little bit got a chip on her shoulder. I said this in another show once,

I spoke with her, she said she heard all the chatter last season. You know, the disrespect was loud and now she's got a fresh slate, she's healthy and she's just letting her game do the talking. I have Kiki as a reserve all-star. She's been fantastic, but she was very close to making a starter vote for me,

but I ultimately still said Jonquell just because of how strong The Liberty had started. They're having a bit of an injury bug in losing right now. But so so will we are we all in a grants that basically fee Asia and Stewie are the Givens? Yeah, 100 percent, 100 percent. And I had Kiki because because whenever Shakira and they was injured this year, Kiki stepped up in the road that I didn't even expect her to step up in. So I feel like we'll miss one letter step up in this role.

Star starter. I mean, she was Ricky in a month, right? And I'm surprised you didn't bring up, you know, your Atlanta dream. Like, Bree Jones is a reserve candidate. Angel Reese is a reserve candidate as well. Aliyah Boston is leading, you know, one of the leading front court players in the fan vote, but she also has a reserve case. So there's a lot of talent here.

Logan, what was you saying? I was gonna say, oh, first of all, I have been loving watching Satu play recently. Like, I don't know, well, you said it with the comments. She has something to her, but I even feel like she's starting to get big outside of like the inner circle of the W because I was at

The Chicago and Phoenix game the other day and somebody texted me unicorn is balling mind you this isn't like this person can't even name the whole fever team at this point Know that she's called unicorn that is crazy But I think my team is actually a mix of both of y'all's if If I'm not mistaken, it might look a bit more like Juju's. Oh, it is Juju's. We have the exact, oh wait, except for Jay-J. Oh, except for Kaylee, yeah. Okay, so why did you keep Jonquell Jones in yours

despite the injury? Honestly, I didn't fully think of the injury and her possibly not even playing, but pretty much based on history. Her double doubles were insane. And you saw that when she came away from the Liberty, when she stopped playing because of her injury, they took a little dip. They had to completely reconfigure their whole game strategy.

And I mean, we're seeing it now, especially with other players coming down, but she is an impactful player and you were saying it on the show, but it wasn't until she left that you were really able to see her impact. Yeah, for sure. I mean, one could argue, and there's plenty of important players in the Liberty. It's kind of a dumb argument anyway, because I'm sure they don't care, right? But one could argue John Cole Jones is the most important player on the Liberty, but I also could equally make you an argument for why Brianna Stewart is,

or the importance of what, you know what UNESCO is doing out there. So I think what's key is that they got players that are that important, and everyone's willing to sacrifice for one another. Yeah. I love it. And I just wanna say, cause I didn't think we were gonna be talking about the reserves at all.

I thought we had windows to stay into. Brother, I cannot go on this broadcast and not mention the work that Kayla Thorne is out there doing with them Valkyrie. Kayla is out there showing her behind this year after a great, great tenure with the Liberty. You feel me? She bringing the experience.

And Valkyrie been going through injuries. They been going through overseas obligations. And she been a steady ship that's just been tray ball in your mouth. Tray ball to the hole. Game winner. Game winner. overseas obligations and she been a steady ship that's just been trayball in your mouth, trayball to the hole. Game winner. Game. Rebounds. Right. Game winner. Right. Little to Kayla. The week award. Did you see that?

Yeah. Go look out for them Valkyrie brother. Valkyrie no regular just expansion team that you're going to play with. Now you better practice for you. Go over there. Get you one in. Juju, what's the plural of Valkyries again? Valkyrie. I feel like it shouldn't be an answer on Valkyrie. You sound cooler. Yeah, no shout out to Kayla Thornton for Shorsky.

I certainly hope that in one way or another, she finds her way on a reserve role reserves voted in by the coaches, starters, 50% media, I'm sorry, 50% fans, 25% media, 25% players. Yeah, for sure. Oh, is that the end of the show, guys? It is. That was so much fun. I can talk eight more hours on this, but yeah.

Draft Kings, salute. Debating your picks. No, this is a safe space. All opinions welcome. Juju, you're the best. We love having you on. Thank you. Logan, enjoy your time in France.

Thank you all for watching. Good follow. We're presented by DraftKings. DraftKings, the crown is yours. We do Tuesday and Thursday drops. Yes, all the things. We do Tuesday and Thursday drops. Subscribe, comment, follow us on social media.

Tell your friends, get the word out there. We've been waiting for this scraggly, 3,000 subscribers on YouTube. Can y'all get us 20 more people here? Come on, let's do it as a team. Anyway, thank you for tuning in. We'll catch you next week. Bye guys. Thanks for watching!