John Levesque at the Seattle PI offers a critique of the sexualized marketing of women's hoops. He's responding to a recent Sue Bird spread in Dime Magazine, and also maybe to the 'This Is Who I Am" campaign, where Sue is also featured prominently looking hot but slightly stupid.

I love Sue -- she's a good player, seems like a good person, and yes, she's sexy. But I don't really love seeing her glam shots in mags or on national TV ads. Something about it just doesn't feel right. With her poor play lately, she might be developing a little bit of a Kournikova problem. And in addition to the sex-gender thing, there also seems to be a race issue here -- why is Sue Bird the WNBA's It girl instead of Sheryl Swoopes?

I think the problem is this: the WNBA wants to market to current sports fans. Most sports fans are guys. So, the league is trying to appeal to guys who watch men's sports, trying to convince them to give women's hoops a shot. And they think sex is the way to do that.

I don't really like that strategy. I think they should try to appeal to people who don't otherwise watch sports. Try to appeal to women, kids, girls who usually don't spend the weekend watching football on TV. Try to bring in a totally new demographic. And if you want to appeal to these folks, probably Sue Bird in a pink sports bra leaning back, chest out, looking saucy isn't the way to do it. (This is who I am? Is that really who she is?)

I don't mean to be too puritanical about this. I'm enough of a Third Waver to embrace some about of this -- people should feel comfortable with their sexuality, be able to express it, etc. But is that really what's going on here? Don't know...