The Basketball Feelings Podcast, Episode 20: Jordan Ligons

Once I started to internalize those positive things and not like, wait, maybe I’m not good. I had those days where like, ‘Am I trash? Am I not a good basketball player at all?’ Having those talks were the growing pains to getting to where I am now. Nope, you were good, you’re good enough, you were capable of being in those situations.

I knew Jordan Ligons first as warm, curious voice coming through speakers or headphones when I was alone. In the early to mid days of the start of the pandemic, when Spinsters launched, I spent a lot of time at my pottery studio and listened to the show in the early hours of the morning, laughing alone like a little goblin along with Jordan and Haley. Fast forward to being on the show with Jordan, via Zoom, and her still being warm and curious, but now with a sincere and usually laughing face. Fast forward again to Summer League this year, finally meeting Jordan in person, all those things plus instant familiarity and just like, the aura of a wonderful person.

Jordan does a lot of things, and she does them well. She writes, she hosts, she talks to athletes like people, an ease intuitive to her but also I think because she used to play. She did that well too. We talked about her time playing in college (and what it’s like to be good at basketball), how difficult it is to reconcile your own expectations with other people’s and with reality, when she decided to turn away from basketball and how she came back to it.

We also talked about the state of the Lakers — can that team work and moreover, should it? — Russell Westbrook’s resting state of 110%, what happens when franchises aren’t forced to look inward, conversations with WNBA players and Chet Holmgren’s jeans.