Ex-Laker shares honest feelings on LA Sparks' call for male players tryouts: "Don't know what they expected"

The LA Sparks are using an interesting tactic to gain an edge against their competition for the 2025 season. Per reports, the team will hold tryouts for male practice players on April 12. While this is not a new practice, it still garnered much attention from the basketball community.

Since the Sparks made the announcement, the internet trolls have been out in full force. This has resulted in some uncomfortable comments about the Sparks players practicing against men.

Former LA Lakers forward Matt Barnes shared his thoughts on these comments on "All the Smoke" on Tuesday.

"As soon as I saw the question, I didn't even go to the comments initally," Barnes said. "I said 'these comments are gonna be f***ing wild' because they put four beautiful women up there to represent the Sparks. With the pervereted mind that men have I don't know what they expected from that post." (7:12-7:25)

The LA Sparks aren't the first team to use male practice players. In 2010, Kevin Pelton published an article on the WNBA's website about the Seattle Storm using male practice players.

Several stories are online about male practice squads losing to WNBA teams during practice sessions.

During the COVID-riddled seasons, including the WNBA bubble in 2020, teams were temporarily prohibited from utilizing male practice players.

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Forward Cameron Brink shared her honest thoughts on the comments regarding the LA Sparks' tryouts for male practice players

Even the LA Sparks players have spoken up about the comments regarding the upcoming tryouts for male practice players. Forward Cam Brink became candid about this matter on Monday's episode of "Straight to Cam."

Brink admitted to being "icked out" by the comments. Then, she shared her thoughts on the selection process for male practice players.

"First of all we need to heavily vet these men, preferably they're gay," Brink said. "Who are we trusting coming into this gym?" (4:15-4:31)

The LA Sparks are ramping things up as they hope to break a four-year playoff drought — the longest since the team's inception in 1997.

Last season, the Sparks finished with the worst record in franchise history: eight wins and 32 losses. It was also the first time they failed to win ten games in a season.

To help the franchise return to its winning ways, the front office boldly moved to acquire Kelsey Plum from the Las Vegas Aces. They acquired her through a three-team trade that also involved the Seattle Storm. In exchange, they gave the Storm the second overall pick in this upcoming draft and the Aces the 13th pick.