Welcome to the first edition of Mercury Monday where we take a look at news stories surrounding the Phoenix Mercury from the last week.

The Mercury opened their training camp roster with 18 players this year. They have to whittle this down to 12 for the regular season roster. As with every team there are core players, ones which should get a spot and the ones fighting for the end of the bench. Below is how the Mercury will probably view their roster

 

Definite Probable Fighting for a spot
DeWanna Bonner Emma Cannon Alex Harden
Brittney Griner Marie Gulich Raisa Musina
Camille Little Leilani Mitchell Chelsea Nelson
Sancho Lyttle Angel Robinson Alexis Prince
Briann January Stephanie Talbot Chatrice White
Diana Taurasi Yvonne Turner Imani Wright

The six definite players pick themselves. Diana Taurasi is one of the all-time greats and Brittney Griner is the future of the franchise. DeWanna Bonner is an all-star calibre player who was out of the league last year but will fit back in easily.

Camille Little and Sancho Lyttle are defensive powerhouses who will make it a tough 48 minutes for the opposition every night. Briann January will be the teams starting point guard after being traded for prior to the 2018 WNBA draft.

On the list of probable’s Leilani Mitchell is pretty much a lock to retain her place. She is a spark-plug scorer who can space the floor with her shooting. Emma Cannon, Yvonne Turner and Stephanie Talbot all impressed at various points last year and should also make the cut quite easily.

Marie Gulich, the 12th pick of the draft looks a good prospect and will probably get most of the backup center minutes which went to Cayla George last year. The player most in danger of missing the cut is Angel Robinson. She started last year when Griner went down but  with averages of 3.9 points and rebounds per game last season has not shown enough to warrant choosing her over Gulich.

This training camp is going to be intense as all the other players will be fighting to gain a spot on the regular season roster of a Mercury team who should be a contender this year.

The Mercury start their pre-season campaign with a hit-out against the Seattle Storm in Seattle on the eighth of May. They then host the Storm in Phoenix on the 12th of May. The regular season then starts on the 18th of May with the Mercury hosting the new-look Dallas Wings.

Come back next Monday for the next installment of Monday Mercury.

 

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