So, I was watching the Mercury and the Sky game a couple of nights ago. And this is something that I have wanted to make a video about. I’m like, do I do this? Is there enough to make a video about this and are people going to be interested? Screw it. I’m going to talk a little bit about the Mercury, who are a team that just keep finding players on the margins.
They keep doing it. They find players on the margins all the effing time. And Astou Ndour Prechtel is someone that if you would ask me about her playing overseas and stuff, I was never that high on Astou Ndour Prechtel. I watched her play for the Mystics last year in preseason. She was okay. She looked okay.
But she’s in significantly better shape this year. That is one thing I noticed. And I thought she looked real good. And I mean real, real good in preseason against the Sky. But let’s take a look at her highlights. She’s about 6’5.
If you’re looking at her playing against the Chicago Sky, she’s in early in the game against Kamilla Cardoso here. Misses the layup, goes, gets an offensive board and draws a foul from Kamilla. And watch this. 6’5. She gets it at the three-point line. She gets it long two, long two, long two, reverse pivot into the three. Bang.
Bang. I think it’s the black line. I think it’s the NBA three, isn’t it? The white line? She plays a little bit of defense, gets a rebound, takes the ball up the floor. But again, she does it again. She pulls again off the reverse pivot rip three at 6’5. Like a nice pure-looking jump shot. This is genuinely impressive.
Pick gets it in the mid-range, jab step, hits a cutter coming through. And this is a player that I was like, okay. She has not shown too much as a WNBA player. But this is where when you recruit on the margins and when you look for archetypes, this is what you find.
Cool. We can find a stretch big. We can find a stretch big, 6’5, not incredibly immobile, and you just never know. You genuinely just never know what player is going to do.
So obviously Astou Ndour Prechtel again, and they’re working on a three ball. Not a bad-looking shot. Feet look a little bit wonky, but not a bad jump shot. Replicable enough.
And again, shooting off reverse pivot threes. Shooting off high post. How many players in the WNBA are going to get the ball in this situation here and be able to get the ball in a position where you’re meant to be handing the ball off? How many are getting it high post and immediately reverse pivoting into a three-point shot? That is not an easy shot to shoot, and she goes and does it twice.
How many players are reverse pivoting into that shot at 6’5? There’s really not that many.
Mercury have a 6’5 Kayla name Prechtel she can shoot from anywhere. Scouts running circles around Indiana scouts. Fair.
Jillian Alleyne was a Mercury draft pick. Yeah, I don’t think Jillian Alleyne is going to make it. But Prechtel is genuinely probably going to make that roster. She’s probably going to make the roster.
Obviously a player that played in Stanford. Was she on that Stanford team that won? I think she was on that Stanford team, wasn’t she? I think that was before the end of the transfer era.
She hasn’t played a WNBA game in her career. Born in ’01, she was a third-round pick in 2023.
So in college she lost to UConn in the Final Four as a junior. And in that 2020-2021 season, she had seven points in the NCAA championship game. So by WNBA standards, she should be on GOAT trajectory. She won a natty. She should be one of the GOATs, the greatest to ever play. She should be on that GOAT trajectory.
But look, it is one of those things where the Mercury just seem to be able to find these players. They just seem to be able to find these players that can do good stuff.
I didn’t think Kat Westbeld had the greatest stats in the world when Kat was playing overseas. I didn’t think she had the greatest stats in the world. Suddenly Kat Westbeld comes over as a starter.
Monique Currie McCarty, yeah, I knew about Monique Currie McCarty. She was killing in France. But some of these players they’re able to just find. The way they recruit is exceptional.
Which is why I’m so scared about this team stealing Justeen Pissott.
For people being like, “Oh, if they were going to take her, why wouldn’t they just take her in the draft?” They did not have a pick at the time by the time Pissott was gone.
And they also used all their picks on stashes. They’re pulling a Liberty. They’re using all their picks on stashes and they signed every UDFA. They signed every undrafted free agent.
And suddenly you’ve now got a 6’5 shooter who is much more equipped to play for this team and to play in a Thibault system because he just wants everyone to shoot than Kalani Brown is.
You don’t lose much size having a 6’5 shooter out there. And you’re still going to get size. This is a huge, huge pickup.
And look, I don’t know if Astou Ndour Prechtel is going to be good or going to be great at a lot of aspects of basketball, but this is Nate Thibault. It’s the Nate Thibault system.
All he needs her to do: shoot the three ball, play somewhat passable defense, catch and finish Thomas’s passes at the three-point line in very limited minutes, and run her ass off in limited minutes.
That’s pretty much what she has to do.
So I’m going to be real here. This is very much a player that is exactly what the Mercury are looking for.
Unfortunately, the Indiana Fever currently have a rookie who is also exactly what the Mercury are looking for, which could be an interesting one.
And if you don’t know anything when it comes to the Mercury, they have basically eight players that are dead set, and then there’s a few like Keiana Williams, Astou Ndour Prechtel that probably will make the team. And there’s a lot of others that really don’t have a shot of making the team that are just kind of there to be there.
And yeah, that is pretty much it.
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