The Phoenix Mercury played its first playoff game of the postseason last week without their star center, Brittney Griner, who is sitting in a Russian penal colony following her nine-year sentence for inadvertently carrying less than a gram of cannabis oil in her suitcase when she traveled to Russia. Griner has played with Russia's national women’s team for the past seven years.
Though there is talk of a possible prisoner swap that could free Griner and former US Marine Paul Whelan, one wonders what the WNBA superstar will come back to in terms of her pro basketball career.
