SEATTLE — Among the Seattle Storm’s players and the other sports training staff members, Melony Cable is known as “Magic Mel.” New players don’t even know her full name, she says with a smile.
The nickname is still a little embarrassing for the Storm’s team acupuncturist. But over the years, she’s come to accept it as a sign of endearment from the players and her fellow training staff members.
“Now I just take it as a joke, like ‘You’re magic, every time you touch them,’ but it’s a nice gesture,” Cable said. “It means a lot that we’re helping (the players) so much and they appreciate that.”
It’s not just Cable, either. The Storm’s training staff consists of two chiropractors, a nutritionist, a massage therapist, two sports performance coaches, two team doctors, an athletic trainer and a physical therapist, among others. No other WNBA franchise lists such an extensive staff on their online roster, though other teams could be contracting outside specialists that aren’t full-time employees.
As the Storm embark on another playoff run — their seventh straight — it’s people like Cable and other trainers who help the players recover from the rigors of the WNBA season.
And for 41-year-old Sue Bird, who’s set to retire at the end of this year after 21 seasons, that kind of extensive care fuels longevity.
“Sometimes one [care method] takes precedence over another, but for the most part, it’s the combination of it all,” Bird said. “It’s been crucial.”
General manager Talisa Rhea calls the Storm’s nearly dozen-strong training staff a “well-rounded, fully comprehensive care team.” Two unaffiliated sports medicine doctors, and another WNBA team’s head athletic trainer, all agree that the Storm’s staff is “comprehensive.”
“We have a leg up sometimes because we have so many resources that help us to stay healthy,” head coach Noelle Quinn said.
The Storm’s ownership has made it a priority to provide all the possible resources for players to perform at the highest level, Rhea said.
The extensiveness of a team’s medical training staff is partially dependent on finances, said Dr. Ashwin Rao, who’s practiced with UW Athletics and the Seahawks. But the players’ needs and the structure of the athletic staff’s “care model” all factor in, too, he said.
The Storm staff has helped Breanna Stewart through a series of Achilles injuries and Bird through multiple left knee issues in past seasons, among other players.
“The season is very compact with a lot of games in a short turnaround,” Quinn, a former Storm player herself, said. “(So) to have the resources that we have to keep the players happy — physically, mentally, emotionally — all those things matter.”
This year, no Storm player has missed a game due to a basketball-related injury, according to the team’s pregame availability reports.
That’s because the sports training staff’s job doesn’t just start once there’s an injury.
Every practice and game means wear-and-tear on the athlete’s body, chiropractor Dustin Williams said, so the medical staff tries to be “preventive as opposed to reactive,” he added.
