On July 21, an ESPN profile on Sophie Cunningham revealed her stance on trans athletes participating in women’s sports. In her conversation with Hallie Grossman, Cunningham advocated for protecting young girls from “biological men,” and her take divided the WNBA fanbase in two. While she got support, the Fever guard continues to deal with massive backlash from one side of the fanbase. Yet, instead, the controversy had an unexpected effect on her visibility, and now, equally unexpectedly, Riley Gaines has claimed the 29-year-old deserves to win Female Athlete of the Year.
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Gaines recently appeared on the Benny Show, where the host, Benny Johnson, said that Sophie Cunningham should win the award for her “bravery” and efforts to “preserve female athletics.” Gaines tagged in and revealed her thoughts as well.
“Outside of her bravery, let’s take that away for a second. Her favorability rating, if that’s a good way to put it, is like 95% of sports fans. And that’s really, really rare in both male and female sports.”
“Her singing at the bar, Toby Keith, red, white, and blue was the most like iconic thing ever. And you don’t see that, especially in female athletes. So absolutely, if she’s not ‘Female Athlete of the Year’, it’s rigged.”
“Look at what her stock has done. She came out with this new shoe with Adidas. It sold out within moments. Of every size. Her stock is there.”
The shoe in question is the Adidas Crazy Energy. Despite Sophie Cunningham only getting the player-exclusive colorway of an already existing Adidas, the initial batch lasted less than 24 hours on the company’s webstore.
The shoe sold out on release morning and is now selling upwards of six times the retail price on StockX, with the last sale being a whopping $652 on August 25. This is staggering for a shoe that’s not even a signature model like Clark is getting with the Nike Caitlin 1.
Yet, it’s not just the shoes. When the season started, the Fever guard was nowhere near Caitlin Clark when the season started. However, following the controversy, she has gained over 1.4 million followers on Instagram and has tied Clark for the second most-followed WNBA athlete on the platform.
She is now roughly 1.2 million shy of catching up to Angel Reese, and neither Reese nor Clark is growing as quickly as Sophie Cunningham.
That being said, only five basketball players have ever won it. Sheryl Swoopes in 1993, Rebecca Lobo in 1995, Candace Parker in 2008 and 2021, Caitlin Clark in 2024, and A’ja Wilson in 2025.
All these winners have had an exemplary basketball resume in their winning years. For example, Cunningham’s teammate Caitlin Clark put the world on notice in her rookie season, shattering rookie season records and boosting the WNBA’s broadcast partners’ viewership beyond a million mark for the first time in nearly 16 years.
The most recent winner was the Las Vegas Aces’ Wilson, who secured her fourth MVP honor, all while winning her third WNBA championship in four years as a two-time Finals MVP.
While Sophie Cunningham is undoubtedly a great squad player for head coach Stephanie White, her current numbers are not enough to match the previous Female Athlete of the Year winner. Cunningham is currently averaging 8.4 points on 44.1% shooting from outside the arc this season with the Fever.
Whether her rapid rise to public popularity this season, along with the fact that the Fever are one of the favorites to win the WNBA title, might be enough to win her the coveted award remains to be seen.