The WNBA sees talented players come and go far too easily. That's because of roster restrictions placed on teams, allowing them to only hold up to 12 players and require them to have at least 11 on the roster. With salary cap taken into account, many teams don't even carry 12 players to save space for an additional signing if the opportunity arises down the road of a season.
Aari McDonald knows this fact all too well. The former 3rd overall pick for the Atlanta Dream has bounced between the Dream, the Los Angeles Sparks, and now the Indiana Fever over a career that has spanned just five seasons. For a player as talented as McDonald, that might be hard to believe. But, players like her, or Julie Vanloo as a more recent example, are simply victim to far too small roster sizes.
McDonald has luckily found a team in Indiana this season, though, and she's made the most of her opportunity with the Fever. And, she's going to have a golden opportunity to exact some revenge on the Los Angeles Sparks on Saturday as the teams clash in Indiana.
McDonald can exact revenge on Sparks
McDonald averaged 8.7 points per game along with 3.7 assists and two rebounds in 26 games played and 10 games started for the injury-riddle Sparks last season. Despite some great play from her in that stint, Los Angeles didn't extend another deal to McDonald in the offseason to stay on as, at least, a bench guard to back up Kelsey Plum.
As we've seen with the Sparks this season, the guard depth on the team is especially thin behind Plum, making the decision to let McDonald walk feel even sillier on their part. Hindsight is 20/20, so we can't trash Los Angeles too much for making a decision that, at the time, they couldn't have known would look so bad in present day.
READ MORE: Fever can completely bust this Commissioner's Cup myth this season
McDonald doesn't exactly seem like the vengeful type - she's genuinely been all smiles since first landing with the Fever when she was called upon to be a hardship player with Clark out with a quad injury at the start of the season, and has been the exact same since being picked up again with DeWanna Bonner getting waived.
But, it'll still be nice to see her be able to flex just a bit against her former team that didn't necessarily see the same vision for her that head coach Stephanie White and the Fever front office clearly have.