WNBA players join Jacob Blake strikes, wear shirts with bullet holes in back

(Image credit: Julio Aguilar/Getty Images)

published 27 August 2020

The WNBA on Wednesday postponed games in solidarity with with protests across the country and strikes in other sports leagues, including the NBA, in response to the police shooting of Jacob Blake, an unarmed Black man, in Kenosha, Wisconsin, on Sunday.

At first, reports indicated the WNBA was planning a unique form of protest, in which games would go on, but play would stop every seven minutes. Ultimately, the games were called off.

Players from six of the league's teams — the Washington Mystics, Atlanta Dream, Minnesota Lynx, Connecticut Sun, Phoenix Mercury, and Los Angeles Sparks — joined together at the league's bubble site in Bradenton, Florida, and took a knee while wearing shirts that spelled out "Jacob Blake."

The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

The back of the shirts were also designed to appear as if they were riddled with bullet holes, a reference to the fact that Blake was shot multiple times in the back. Tim O'Donnell

Explore More

Tim is a staff writer at The Week and has contributed to Bedford and Bowery and The New York Transatlantic. He is a graduate of Occidental College and NYU's journalism school. Tim enjoys writing about baseball, Europe, and extinct megafauna. He lives in New York City.