WNBA superstar and U.S. Olympian Candace Parker announced her retirement yesterday. She and Russian Olympian Anna Petrakova are raising two children and expecting a third this spring, so of course I have to offer a Mombian take on what she’s shown us about parenthood as well as basketball.
Parker is one of the WNBA’s all-time greats, a two-time Olympic gold medalist, the first player in WNBA history to win a championship with three different teams (Los Angeles, Chicago, and Las Vegas), and the only player to win MVP and Rookie of the Year in the same season (2008); she was also MVP in 2013 and a 10-time All-WNBA honoree, among many career honors.
She made her retirement announcement on Instagram, saying, “I promised I’d never cheat the game & that I’d leave it in a better place than I came into it.” While she had intended to play in the upcoming season for the Las Vegas Aces, she cited a foot injury and ongoing pain after 10 surgeries during her career as the reasons for her retirement, saying, “My HEART & body knew, but I needed to give my mind time to accept it.”
Her family was on her mind, too, as she thought back to her last game of last season, writing, “I always wanted to walk off the court with no parade or tour, just privately with the ones I love. What now was to be my last game, I walked off the court with my daughter. I ended the journey just as I started it, with her.”
She had given birth to her daughter between her first and second WNBA seasons with the Los Angeles Sparks, while in a previous relationship. She and Petrakova, who had played on Russia’s Olympic basketball team, then had a son in 2022, and announced last December that they are expecting a third child, saying, “Mama and Mommy are switching from man-2-man to zone defense this spring!”
Parker has long been aware of the need to balance work and parenthood, setting an example for us all. In 2009, while she was still pregnant with her daughter, she told ESPN the Magazine, “The baby will be along for the ride, with me on trips, at the court. You don’t hear about male players doing that, do you? Women, we just have to balance more things. It’s harder for us. That’s just the way it is. For now.” Last year, she said Petrakova and their kids were the reason she chose to leave the Chicago Sky and join the Las Vegas Aces.
Her daughter, too, was the reason she and Petrakova chose to come out in 2021 and to announce their private 2019 marriage. “I always tell my daughter to be herself,” she told TIME magazine. “I always tell my daughter to be proud of who she is. And I always tell my daughter to speak for herself and speak up for those that she loves. And I can’t say that to her if I’m not doing it myself. I don’t want her to ever think that I’m ashamed or not proud of our family. That was a step that we had to take. But we had to take it on our own terms.”
While she said in her retirement announcement that she will need time to “mourn” leaving her playing years, she also looked ahead, asserting, “This is the beginning…I’m attacking business, private equity, ownership (I will own both a NBA & WNBA team), broadcasting, production, boardrooms, beach volleyball, dominoes (sorry babe it’s going to get more real) with the same intensity & focus I did basketball.”
Nevertheless, she insisted, “Being a wife & mom still remains priority #1 & I’ve learned that time flies, so I plan to enjoy my family to the fullest!”
Good for her! Clearly, we haven’t heard the last of her, though—and I can’t wait to see what she does next. I’m guessing it will include spending lots of time with their family’s new arrival, then continuing to show us how to balance family and career.