Sophie Cunningham names her 1 NBA player comparison

Sophie Cunningham sees a bit of herself in one particular NBA player.

The Indiana Fever star Cunningham was speaking this week with basketball trainer Drew Hanlen on the latest episode of their “No Hesitation” podcast. During the episode, Hanlen brought up the blistering start to the new season by Los Angeles Lakers superstar Luka Doncic and jokingly compared Doncic to Cunningham.

Hanlen noted that Doncic (through just his first nine games) has already surpassed some of Cunningham’s raw stats from the entire 2026 WNBA season. Cunningham then retorted that she had a better NBA player comparison for herself — Doncic’s Lakers teammate Quentin Grimes.

“He also makes $50 million a year,” said Cunningham of Doncic. “I make $700,000 on my WNBA check. You should compare me more to Quentin Grimes. We average around 8-10 points. I think that’s it. My 3-point shooting is actually better than both of them. If we’re gonna compare, let’s compare.”

Indeed, Cunningham averaged 7.9 points per game for the Fever last season (compared to 8.0 points per game so far this season for Grimes on the Lakers). Cunningham is also correct that her three-point percentage number from 2026 (41.9) is beating those of both Grimes (24.2) and Doncic (40.8) so far this year.

The discussion was obviously humorous and tongue-in-cheek as there is no true comparison between the NBA game and the WNBA game. But it at least shows that Cunningham is keeping a good, realist sense of humor about her role in the WNBA (even if she might not necessarily be back with the Fever in 2027).