It’s hard to imagine the Valkyries selling, but there are various kinds of improvements they could look at.

I used the Sportrac WNBA trade machine to see what deals might be realistic and available for Golden State.

Both Thornton and Jocyte’s names are going to be here a lot for a couple of reasons; Jocyte is Golden State’s most valuable non-draft pick asset and clearly has not been a fit this season, one way or another. Getting something out of her if she isn’t going to play is on the table.

As for Thornton, it’s simple salary cap math. In order to stay cap compliant, they’ll have to match salary, and Thornton’s $750,000 expiring contract is the best fit. If they were to get a big, for example, or a guard that would push Williams into the front court, they can afford to go without Thornton.

Kaila Charles and Tiffany Hayes each make $600,000, which for a lot of these deals is just slightly too little to get it done with the other pieces.

Keep in mind, Ndjakalenga Mwenentanda and Nadia Fingall have combined as the replacement player for Iliana Rupert (pregnancy), so the $276,585 committed to them does not count. That puts them $148,440 under the cap rather than $128,145 over, which matters significantly for trades especially for an expiring contract that’s off the books for next year anyways.