Not one Atlanta Dream player made the WNBA All-Star starting five this year, despite three of them posting numbers that would headline most rosters in the league. WNBA analyst Autumn Johnson thinks the voting system is what failed them, and Rhyne Howard’s case is where she starts.
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“Angel said it best. It was a slap in the face. Specifically for Rhyne Howard, who has been easily a top five guard in this league, a two-way player,” she said. “For Rhyne Howard to lead the league in steals, tied for first in threes made, and a top 13 scorer, I was very shocked to learn that the Dream were not represented as starters. Popularity beat production here.”
Looking at the stats, it’s not hard to see the point Johnson is trying to make. Howard is averaging 18.9 points on 41.6% shooting from the field and 36.8% from three, leading the WNBA in steals at 2.5 per game, and tied with Marina Mabrey for the most made threes in the league at 67.
Part of what worked against Howard specifically is how she’s classified. She’s officially listed as a guard, but plays more like a wing, closer to a small forward in how she’s actually used on the floor. That mismatch mattered because the All-Star ballot requires a fixed number of guard slots, and it put her up against a genuinely stacked field at a position she doesn’t fully fit.
It showed up directly in the vote totals. Howard finished with a weighted score of 6, trailing Paige Bueckers, Olivia Miles, Caitlin Clark, and Kelsey Mitchell, all of whom finished ahead of her. She actually placed second among players voting, a strong signal of respect from her peers, but dropped all the way to ninth in the fan vote, which was enough to push her to fifth overall, one spot outside the cutoff.
That gap between how players and fans saw her season is exactly the kind of discrepancy Johnson is pointing to.
Reese’s own snub barely registered as a surprise to her.
“For those two though, I think they work so hard and they put a lot of work in, and the way that they’re guarded every game and they have to adjust,” Reese said. “The reason why we’re where we are is because of those two. For us not to have anyone was just a slap in the face, but they’re not going to say anything. I am.”
That frustration is why Johnson’s proposed fix cuts straight to the voting formula itself.
“I honestly think the media deserves 50% of voting, period,” Johnson said.
The story didn’t end at the snub, though. All three Dream players, Reese, Howard, and Gray, were later named All-Star reserves by the league’s head coaches, giving Atlanta more reserve selections than any other team. The starting-five omission still stung, but the roster itself will include the full trio in Chicago regardless.
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None of this controversy has derailed what’s actually a strong season for the Dream. They enter this stretch with one of the most balanced rosters in the league, anchored by Reese’s rebounding and a defense that ranks fourth in the WNBA under head coach Karl Smesko.
That balance was tested recently. A five-game losing streak in late June and early July exposed real cracks, made worse by injuries to center Brionna Jones and a stretch where Reese herself missed time with a right leg issue that disrupted the frontcourt rotation.
Atlanta’s next stretch brings a tougher test of where the team actually stands, with matchups against the Las Vegas Aces and Dallas Wings on the schedule before the league pauses for All-Star Weekend on July 24-25 in Chicago, the same event where Reese, Howard, and Gray will finally take the court together as reserves.