WME Sports is making its first foray into on-court representation in the WNBA with the signing of Las Vegas Aces guard Kelsey Plum. WME will represent the 27-year-old Plum both on and off the court, marking a new on-court business endeavor for the marketing-focused agency.
Signing Plum, a 2022 WNBA All-Star, is the first step on WME Sports’ plan to make deeper inroads into the WNBA. Zack Miller, who currently represents two-time WNBA champion and Chicago Sky forward Candace Parker on the marketing side, among others, will represent Plum on both fronts as he looks to sign additional players to their practice.
“Kelsey is the perfect client to join our WME Sports roster and kick off our on-court representation for WNBA,” said Miller. “The business we have built over the past few years with our WNBA clients Candace Parker and Sabrina Ionescu has been a foundation for the work we will do with Kelsey and future W players that are true multi-hyphenates both on and off the court.”
WME Sports also represents Aces head coach Becky Hammon and team president Nikki Fargas.
Growth in areas such as the agency’s coaching and front office practices, as well as football representation, had been a focus at WME Sports over the last several years, as evidenced by the hires of Bret Just and NFL player agents Brian Ayrault and Ben Renzin. But the Endeavor (NYSE: EDR) subsidiary has also had a particular eye on expanding its player representation work within professional basketball.
Endeavor, a global sports and entertainment conglomerate, acquired a stake in BDA Sports Management in late 2020 that brought veteran basketball agent Bill Duffy into the fold as a strategic advisor. Duffy’s clients included a number of current and retired NBA players, as well as the New York Liberty’s Ionescu. WME Sports handles Ionescu’s off-court representation.
The move to the on-court side of the WNBA will take those efforts one step further.
Plum, a 2020 Olympic gold medalist and the No. 1 overall pick in the 2017 WNBA draft, joins several high-profile female athletes on WME Sports’ roster, among them tennis greats Serena and Venus Williams and Emma Raducanu, as well as Olympians Sydney McLaughlin, Allyson Felix and Lindsay Vonn.
