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By Torrey Hart
The Seattle Storm’s Sue Bird led WNBA jersey sales for the 2020 season, marking the first time in her 17-year career that the 11-time All-Star topped the list, the league announced on Oct. 2.
The Phoenix Mercury’s Diana Taurasi ranked second, the Los Angeles Sparks’ Candace Parker third, the New York Liberty’s Sabrina Ionescu fourth, and the Minnesota Lynx’s Maya Moore fifth.
Moore, notably, did not play either of the last two seasons — in February 2019, she announced she would be putting her career on pause to pursue activism; she did not make the top-10 in jersey sales for the 2019 season. Moore was successful in her main cause: working to free a wrongly incarcerated man, Jonathan Irons, from prison, after decades. In September, the duo announced they had married.
In addition to Ionescu, rookies Satou Sabally and Courtney Vandersloot also cracked the top-10 at No. 9 and 10, respectively. 2020 season MVP A’ja Wilson of the Las Vegas Aces finished sixth in sales.
The Storm topped the team ranks, with the Liberty second, Sparks third, Aces fourth and Lynx fifth.
Though the spot was locked up after opening weekend, when it was seemingly everywhere, the WNBA “orange hoodie” was also reaffirmed as the best-selling item in the league’s history. Ahead of the season, the league seeded them to WNBA “influencers,” including sending 140 to the NBA bubble.
Players including LeBron James and Damian Lillard wore the hoodies in public, as did other professional athletes like Naomi Osaka, helping to draw national attention to the W.
