By DENNIS HANS                    August 31, 2001

Regular readers of InsideHoops.com feast every Friday on the keen insights and breezy style of WNBA reporter and ESPN commentator Fran Harris. I caught an occasional regular season game on the tube, but in the past couple weeks I've watched quite a few WNBA playoff battles. These got my mind percolating, and I recently transferred these thoughts from my head to my computer via a highly technical process I call "Brain to Bytes." You'll be the judge if any make sense.

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MVP Lisa Leslie showcased her smart, versatile, polished game with a dominating 35-point, 16-rebound, 7-block performance that put the nail in the Sacramento Monarchs coffin. She showed why she's a role model for hoopsters of all ages and both sexes.

Leslie has never been satisfied merely to be an all-star. She returns each spring with a more well-rounded game than the season before. She has become a terrific passer from the high and low posts. She's become a better individual and team defender. She has the three-point shot, the mid-range jumper and an array of low-post moves. Guard her tight on the outside and she'll put it on the floor and score with either hand. As complete as her game is, you can bet the farm she'll return in 2002 with a new skill or two and even more polish on her current repertoire.

Leslie knows that effort alone doesn't make you better. It's the right type of effort, and if you can't teach yourself new skills, and your coaching staff can't help, you need to find someone who can. Consider the legendary Georgetown trio (Ewing, Mutombo and Mourning), who spent many an offseason together, pumping iron and hammering each other on the court. Did any of them ever come back the next season with a new move, a smoother shot or better footwork? This past season, commentators noted that Mutombo developed a more well-rounded scoring game after coming to Philly. The guy is 34 years old! He's always had it in him. Where were his coaches his first ten seasons? Or in college, for that matter?

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During three fastbreaks in the decisive Sparks-Monarchs game, ESPN cameras zeroed in on the Monarchs coach, who was doing what us fans wished we could do: watch the fastbreak. ESPN should fire any director who fails to keep the cameras on the players. Let's focus on the athletes, not middle-aged folk in business attire watching or shouting at the athletes. 

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NBA and WNBA PR machines hype playoff matchups such as Leslie vs. Yolanda Griffith or Shaq vs. Tim Duncan, but when the whistle blows they don't guard each other. Fans want to see them go toe to toe. The players want to go toe to toe. Alas, the threat of foul trouble stemming from the ridiculous foul-out rule -- for which there are sensible solutions that would not turn the game into a street fight -- keeps coaches from matching them up. 

Other sports don't have this problem. Great nose tackles battle great centers, great pitchers face great hitters, and great servers challenge great returners. 

Understandably, coaches want to minimize the chances of foul trouble, like that which plagued Griffith in Game 3. Two quick whistles had her walking on egg shells in the most important game of her WNBA career. Only in basketball are great athletes regularly reduced to cautious, timid play -- or worse, sitting and watching -- for long stretches of critical games. Fortunately, the Sparks completely outclassed the Monarchs start to finish Monday, so foul trouble didn't influence the outcome. Too often it does. This structural problem needs to be remedied. 

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Tari Phillips, the New York Liberty's all-star center who routinely outplays much taller foes, is an inside force and a fine mid-range shooter. But she struggles at the stripe, shooting just 58 percent during the regular season. When Charlotte beat New York 48-44 Monday, eliminating the Liberty, she missed 4 of 6. Her arms are not in synch with her legs -- there's no rhythmic "arms come up as the knees bend down" release. The result is erratic distance control and poor rotation. The announcers and coaches who say it's a matter of concentration simply don't know what they're talking about. Phillips -- a smart, dedicated pro -- has correctable technical flaws, not a concentration problem. Call me, Tari.

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What is it with Sacramento and underachieving point guards? Recently departed King Jason Williams has no peer when it comes to poor shot selection and bad overall judgment. While Williams never met a shot he wouldn't take, Ticha Penicheiro has yet to meet one she would. Her pass-first mentality reached absurd proportions Monday night when she drove baseline and elevated a few feet from the hoop with not an L.A. Spark in sight. She didn't convert the uncontested layup because she forgot to look at the basket. Instead she looked to her right and spotted a cluster of defenders between her and her teammates. An impossible pass produced a turnover. 

You cannot be a great playmaker without scoring skills. If you allow the defense to play five against four, your team is doomed. The teams that advanced to the Finals have complete playmakers. The Liberty and Monarchs do not. Penicheiro's hero is Magic Johnson. Does she know he averaged 20 a game on 51 percent shooting? The Showtime Lakers did not play offense four against five.

Penicheiro is a tremendous talent, but she's an offensive liability. She has an erratic 3-point set shot (when she remembers to shoot it), no mid-range jumper and no reliable finishing moves. Anyone with her coordination can learn to shoot a jumpshot and convert off the dribble. But she needs expert individual instruction. Call me, Ticha.

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The WNBA suffers many of the maladies that plague the NBA: too much grabbing, pushing and clawing, not enough freedom of movement. A 48-44 game may be dramatic, but it's not exciting. You want fans to say "ooh" and "aah," not "ouch" and "ugh."

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Like some NBA announcers, the WNBA duo of John Saunders and Nancy Lieberman can't distinguish between legitimate and illegitimate acting: The legit stuff (playing possum, then pouncing on a lazy inbounds pass; looking left and dishing right) is aimed at the opposition, not the refs. 

On August 24, during the Charlotte-New York game, Dawn Staley was trapped. So she wrapped her free arm around Teresa Weatherspoon and then appeared to fall down. (I say "appeared" because only Staley knows for certain if she lost her balance or took a dive.) The official -- who has but a split second to render a verdict -- called a foul on Weatherpoon.

Play-by-play-man Saunders said, without a hint of irony or sarcasm, that we had just witnessed something beautiful. Both he and Lieberman gave Staley's apparent flop two thumbs up. So here we have a league that reminds us every commercial break what great role models the players are for young girls, yet the announcers -- one of whom is an all-time great herself -- praise cheating. Deliberate deception of the refs is cheating. A majority of the players don't engage in this stuff, and they have a low opinion of those who do. Yet the announcers praise cheating and many coaches tolerate it -- or worse, teach it. 

Passing and dribbling are basketball skills; flopping upon incidental or imaginary contact is a stunt woman's or pro wrestler's skill. When translated to the basketball court and performed for the benefit of refs sworn to uphold the integrity of the game, it's cheating. Let's get rid of every announcer too ignorant to figure this out or too unethical to care. That means Saunders, Lieberman, Danny Ainge, John Thompson, and perhaps others. And when Doug Collins wears out his welcome with the Wizards, let's ban him, too.

Bio:  Dennis Hans is a writer, occasional college professor, and self-proclaimed shooting guru.  His essays have appeared in the New York Times, Washington Post, National Post (Canada) and online at Slate, TomPaine.com, MediaChannel.org and The Black World Today (tbwt.com), among other outlets.  He can be reached at HANS_D@popmail.firn.edu.