Sonia Chase

What's up, everybody?
Welcome back to another week and another episode of Unfiltered Waters.
And this week we venture into the dry land.
We get to feature our very first WNBA, our all-star.
We welcome Sonia Chase to the pod.
Sonia played for the WNBA back in the late 90s, early 2000s, was truly a pioneer in that space.
She is now a badass entrepreneur, a philanthropist, and truly someone who empowers women specifically to go after their dreams and leave a legacy far beyond their sport.
And Sonia honestly was the perfect person to speak with because the collective bargaining agreement just went through in March with the WNBA, which is allowing these incredible women to make their worth when it comes to contracts.
She dives into that.
And we really, through this conversation, found out just how many parallels there are between the WNBA and swimming.
I feel like it's they've really had to battle to get people into the arena.
And once they're in the arena, they see the value of the sport, they see the entertainment factors, but it it was awesome hearing her perspective, having been someone who's been in the game, no pun intended, for a really long time.
And I also loved hearing her stance on how to become an entrepreneur, right?
You go from your sport and you get told what to do by a coach for a really long time.
And then, you know, having the ability to overcome that imposter syndrome is something that Sonia has done over and over and over and helped other women do over and over and over.
Um, she's got some very big projects up ahead as well.
And so it was, I feel like it was almost breaking news when she was speaking about um some ventures that she has in a state that holds near and dear to my heart in Baltimore, Maryland.
But this this conversation was one of those where I wasn't uh I wasn't sure how many parallels there would be to swimming.
Not that there always has to be, but uh so many of you are swimmers or have swimming backgrounds.
And uh, I'm just really proud to bring this conversation to you.
I have to give a huge shout out to the PAC Accelerate.
Uh some of these conversations um that are going to be airing in the next six weeks or so come out of my time at the PAC Accelerate event, which is the pro-athlete community.
They run these incredible summons to bring athletes together from all sports, business leaders together with those athletes and just help them understand their next step, whether they're still in their sport or they just retired.
And so I was able to be out in Scottsdale, uh Arizona at the end of March and have these conversations with athletes that aren't swimmers, some with swimmers, but athletes that aren't swimmers and um such interesting, impactful perspectives across the board.
So I know regardless of whatever sport you're into, this conversation with Sonia will be very enlightening.
So hit that subscribe button, leave us a comment, leave us a like, and enjoy my conversation with Sonia Chase.
Thank you so much for having me.
Yes, you are our first WNBA basketball player.
Oh my gosh, yay! I'm so excited.
Yeah, I feel like we have so much to cover.
We do, so many exciting things have happened.
I want to start because I didn't tell you this before.
I'm 20 weeks pregnant right now.
Oh, congratulations.
Oh my gosh, yes.
No, you didn't.
With a girl.
Oh, congratulations to you.
Very excited.
But hearing you talk about your seven-year-old daughter and kind of now she's figuring out like who you are and what you've accomplished.
How do you, as competitive as you are, how do you shut off the competitor and just be the empathetic mom?
Gosh, that that is really tough.
Um, I think it really goes back to the innocence, right?
And so there is accountability in all walks on all levels of life.
But when you're just starting out, first you have to be taught, right?
Yeah.
Before you can be accountable, you have to understand and have to learn, right?
And be taught.
And I think learning and being a sponge and absorbing, like my daughter is that, and sometimes obviously repetitions and repeating things, it's really important for her to hear so she kind of gets it.
So, like if we're on the basketball court and we're training and she forgets to use her left hand when I tell her the truth, it's okay, right?
Because she's just starting out.
What's going to be interesting as she continues to get, you know, grow and develop her skill set, how she applies that.
But for me, um, it's just understanding that patience is important because it's a part of learning and it's a part of the process.
Yeah.
TV do I have a guess right now.
Yeah, it's a part of the process.
Yes, it is.
It is all a process, yeah.
Well, we were talking earlier about just you know how far you made it in the sport.
You talked about your gold medal at the Olympic festival.
But I feel like seeing your story, it's really inspiring to see.
Like your career was amazing, but what you've done after it is astounding.
Thank you so much.
I appreciate it.
Of course.
And we were talking this morning in the meeting of just you finish the sport, you're like, how in the world am I gonna replicate those highest of highs?
And you have to believe that no, no, you can.
You can continue.
It's just a little bit different.
That's right.
But I feel like athletes either go one way or the other.
They think, okay, I'm just super coachable and I'm a robot and I do what I'm supposed to be told.
They go to the corporate world.
But I personally think that athletes thrive the best as entrepreneurs.
So you're obviously the queen of entrepreneurship.
What are your thoughts on that?
Thank you for that.
I don't think I've ever been called that.
You are.
Um, but I I so, you know, I grew up in a household where both of my parents worked 40 plus years at in their jobs, and they were nine to five workers.
Um, you know, my mother didn't graduate from college until after I was born and became an adult, and she went back to school.
Wow.
Um, my dad um went to HBCU and didn't end up finishing school, right?
But I saw them and how hard they worked, but entrepreneurship wasn't a part of my DNA, right?
And so becoming an athlete and going through the levels of becoming a great athlete, I realized that I was not a behind-the-desk person.
I was not a person that, you know, we travel a lot.
We interact with people, we get interviews, right?
We're used to kind of communicating.
I was a point guard.
Communication is something that I'm I'm used to doing and I'm I'm okay with doing it and I'm comfortable with doing it.
So I knew that I was going to be doing something that involved people, interacting, the community, because I was big on that.
And so when you're going up the ladder to become a pro athlete, you're really involved in the community.
Like, I mean, from day one, you're doing like like the MBA, well, college, you're doing camps, right, in the community.
Then you get to the WNBA, you're doing WNBA, MBA cares, and then when you're overseas, you're doing a lot of that.
So I learned community was very important.
But when I was in college, I realized I wanted to become a corporate attorney.
So I majored in English, and then I realized I got drafted and I was never gonna make it back to law school.
But what I did was I when I when I worked the basketball camps in college, I knew that I wanted to, I didn't want to go into coaching, but I knew I wanted to still be around the sport.
So that's what led me to start my first business, Chase Your Dreams Inc.
And then that followed with Chase Your Dreams Academy, which is the nonprofit leg to Chase Your Dreams Inc.
They essentially do the same thing.
It's just that, you know, I grew up in Baltimore.
Um, and I grew up in a in an era in a community where many kids didn't go to camp.
They couldn't afford.
Yeah.
So when I had my pro my camp for kids that could afford, I knew that I had to do something in the community for low-income children that obviously their parents aren't able to, you know, put food on the table.
So that was really important for me.
So having both organizations at the same time and launching those at the same time was really important for me.
And so I do other businesses, but Chase Your Dreams is like my main, you know, community-oriented business that I really love.
Which is totally your why and you know the reason you get up every day.
But how did you even begin to think?
Oh, I like you think as an athlete, you're like, oh, start a business.
You're like, where in the world do I start?
Like, how did you get the confidence or the mentors or what you needed to jump off the cliff, essentially, for the first time?
It's so funny.
That's a really great question.
Um, I don't think that, I think I had to figure it out.
And I'll say this I came up in the WNBA era where the players association wasn't as foundationally strong as it is now.
Right.
I think they prepare you to transition out when you go and you get drafted or you get you make a team, right?
They have programs, internships, and things.
When I played in an era where when you transition out, you had to figure it out.
So I bounced around.
I did five years of big pharma before I even realized that you know what?
I think I'm gonna do something in the entrepreneurial side.
I think I want to start my own business because I knew I wasn't gonna go in into coaching.
And what better way to do that than start my own businesses and run that through programs like camps and community-oriented programs?
Um, I think it's the grip, the discipline, the self-confidence.
Yeah.
Um, being a woman, right?
Um, we struggle sometimes with uh self-esteem and confidence, but I think playing sports allows us to be able to walk into rooms where there may not be another female and we can still feel like leaders.
And I believe that's what sports did for me, and that's what you need to be an entrepreneur because you got to be able to walk into a room and connect with everybody.
Yeah.
So yeah, absolutely.
How did you because I felt like you know, I was really good at the end of having confidence and grit in sport, but it took me a really long time to realize that that could transfer over because it's such a different skill set.
Yes.
Did you struggle with that transfer over or did it happen automatically?
You know, I think it happened automatically, and I didn't realize it until I was actually applying it, you know, and so it was like, okay, I had I worked hard in sports.
Now I just have to transfer those traits, right?
I communicated well in sports.
I wasn't, you know, perfect, right?
But, you know, I was accountable, you know, I was disciplined, you know, uh, you know, I did everything to allow me to be able to make it to where I did.
And so I knew that if I can just apply that in this walk of life on the entrepreneurial side, perhaps, maybe I can still do and be a successful, you know.
It is different because it's working with people, you gotta understand personalities and things of that nature.
But playing sports allowed me to do that, you know, and understand, and I had to learn my person, you know, my teammates and and know who I could push and who I could pull on.
And that's what entrepreneurship is really all about.
It's it's about hiring a right team and and and then and pushing people to to their you know to their best limits.
And having very strong emotional intelligence.
Absolutely, absolutely.
That's probably the the most important thing, the emotional intelligence.
Yeah, absolutely.
And you can't teach that yeah.
Well, that's I I just like went off my brain as you said that like you were in a team sport, I was in an individual sport.
So I wonder if there's a kind of a difference of athletes who are in individual sports kind of having to learn that a little bit more than team sports.
I don't know.
That's a great question because I often talk to people that may have played golf or tennis or you know, swimming like yourself.
Um, and I think there's some common, I I think ever like a, you know, the the the three circles, there's like individual things we probably have to have, but there's some common traits that we have and the that overlap.
And I and I um I would imagine the discipline, the you know, the accountability, the grit.
But I I I do think that having that self-confidence also is important, but self-confidence in a different way, right?
Because you, you know, and in the individual sport, you you you have to kind of rely on yourself and to to be whereas maybe in a team sport, somebody could come up to you and kind of boost you a little bit, nudge you, and then that'll maybe click on to say, you know what, I can be self-confident as well.
You know, so I can see there could be some differences there.
Yeah.
And it's tough either way, I think.
Either, yeah.
Either way, you're still climbing the mountain.
Yeah, you're still climbing them out, and you've overcame.
Yeah.
So we just talked before we hopped on.
Very exciting news.
Yes.
Oh my gosh.
So exciting just got announced a week ago.
Um, the seven-year collective bargaining agreement.
Yes.
So you obviously know it well, well better than I and saw this coming.
So, what is the most exciting piece of this coming into coming into play?
So there's so many levels to it, right?
Yeah.
Um, I go back to my time and I'm gonna date myself, but it's okay.
I was a part of the first CBA, which was in 1999.
Um, can you imagine we were still trying to figure out like basic, you know, you know, insurance and you know, just you know, support as a as a as a as a mom, as a new mom.
And we didn't have any of that, right?
And um, I always say that back then when I was drafted in in 98, we were in survival mode.
And I think now the women are in strategy mode.
And they, and so going from survival mode to strategy mode, there's been obviously, you know, it's been evolving over time, but what we just experienced is is it's even more than transformational.
I think it's evolutionary, to be honest with you.
So it's been very exciting, and um I know the women really fought hard and they had to remain very um you know together, right?
And to have teamwork because at the end of the day, you know, you're you're depending on the other person to not waver and to stay strong, right?
And to but but to also understand like and see different points of view.
So I I the what they went through was just nothing short of amazing, but I have some numbers that I definitely want to get into because I think it was absolutely stunning for what they you know negotiated.
Yeah, I because I feel like you know, coming from swimming, I don't have context, and a lot of my audience isn't gonna have context.
So ring into context why this is so bad of us.
So, you know, the the the CBA, you're gonna talk 2025, just last year to 2026.
I mean, you got some, I'll just point out like maybe two or three, the salary cap.
You go from 1.5 million last year to 7 million.
Now, we'll put that in perspective, minimum salary, a little under 250,000, now 1.4 million under the new salary cap.
And that is the, I'm sorry, that's the maximum salary.
That's the maximum salary.
So maximum was 250 and 1.5, nearly 1.4 uh for 2026.
Another one, average salary, around 120,000, went up to nearly$600,000.
So just those three statistics right there paints a whole different picture.
And then you get into some of the other things like revenue share, which was huge, right?
Because that was the whole point.
That was the whole point of they were holding out.
It was like revenue share, how can they not share in the revenue after they've put put butts in chairs, after they sold the merchandise, after they've done things that to put bring fans out, right?
Um last thing I'll say is Caitlin Clark.
I've got it, I've got to hand it to her.
She put the league on her shoulders, not to say that folks before her didn't help get to League where it is, but she put that league on her shoulders and now she's gonna go from making 76,000 or around that, less than 80,000, to nearly uh 530,000 just in her second year.
So that gives you some perspective and some numbers that I think you can kind of put in into perspective.
And so well earned.
Just like watching over the last year.
Absolutely.
You bring up Caitlin Clark.
Why do you think she gets so much hate?
You know, I I think it has a lot to do with women being competitive, right?
And um, you know, we're all competitive.
We want to win monopoly games, we want to win, you know, in a game of spades, right?
We we we want to win.
But I I think um when when you have played in a sport and you don't feel like you've gotten the the due diligence, and then someone comes behind you and and it appears as though that person gets to due diligence, it could potentially create some friction.
But I think that the women, and I've always been an advocate of this, we've got to protect our assets.
The women have got to protect assets, and they're all assets, not just Caitlin Clark.
Everybody's an asset.
Yeah, but Caitlin Clark is an asset where people tune in and she brings a whole, she's brought a whole other different demographic to the table that has opened the W up to you know to other fan bases.
And there's not been a person that has truly done that in the way that she's done it.
So we do have to make sure we take care of her so she can stay around for a while because when she's done it's just nothing short of amazing.
But again, like I say, all the women have to take care of each other.
You know, it's not just one person.
So recovery is the superpower, and as you guys know, sleep is a huge part of recovery, and Dream Recovery has a suite of tools to aid in all of this.
One of their brand new drops and brand new products is their weighted blanket.
And let me tell you from personal experience, it is a heaven.
It contains a patented cellulant technology that aids in infrared regulation, which essentially helps with your nervous system down regulation, it helps with circulation, it helps with getting into sleep cycles in a much deeper way.
And all that to say, it is just so magical to get in bed at night with Todd, uh Ali, our dog, and we fall asleep so quickly.
And I will say it has a really cool cooling effect.
So if you're someone who typically sleeps hot, it helps that in a major way as well.
So we actually have a very special code for you guys.
It is UW blanket20, all caps.
It gets you 20% off this product, which is massive.
This is definitely something that is a bit more luxurious than their other products, but it is so worth it.
And of course, unfiltered 30 for 30% off for all other products.
So go shopping, get better sleep, and make recovery your superpower.
Yeah, it's like it's a collective.
It's an inclusive, yeah.
Well, I feel like the same thing happened.
I mean, it happens in every sport for sure where you look back and you're like, you know, even compared to the social media days now of what athletes are getting for brand deals.
You know, I competed in 2004.
I didn't, you know, I didn't have the same.
And but it's interesting to me.
Like, I don't look at that and go, uh, like and get upset.
I'm like, good for them.
Yeah, like we're evolving.
That's a good thing.
Yeah, I I think with women, um, and this is something that I think we all, as women, and I say collectively, you have some women that struggle, you have some women that don't struggle with it.
But I think um if we had more women that did support other women, we probably would be so much farther, maybe down the road.
I think that sometimes it's because women have gotten the shorter end of the stick.
Um, we have not always been in the rooms.
You know, uh, I think that it's if it's a if it's a chair available at that at the table and it's between me and another woman, right?
Because most of the time it's other, you know, men that may be there, then it's a competition between who's gonna get that last seat.
Right.
Such a good point.
Yeah.
And so what has happened is now women are like, let's go make our own table.
Let's go bring our own chairs.
We don't have to compete for that chair.
And I think that's what I'm trying to get to.
It's it's more of a, you know what?
We don't have to compete, like you said, because we can go over here and make our own table, and that's what the WNBA did.
They made their own table and they brought their own chairs, and now everybody has a seat at the table, which is what is is paramount.
And is a hundred times more impactful and stronger doing it collectively.
Absolutely.
It just takes us.
And nobody's left out, you know what I mean?
Nobody's left out.
Yeah, yeah.
How much do you think social media has played a part in Caitlin Clark's rise?
You look at people like Sophie Cunningham, just I I was in the airport, just as crazy.
I like I love her.
I love her personality, she's amazing.
So, like, how much has that, because I know assuming it's played a massive part in the storytelling?
I know it's a big piece for you and your businesses.
What are your thoughts on how athletes should be using that to tell their stories?
In terms of the storytelling and the platform.
Yeah.
So I I we to chat about this before, and I think that the difference between um, so let me back up.
I had the opportunity of working at Deloitte, which was a firm that supports and sponsors um the WNBA as a change maker.
And so through that, I was I managed our sponsorships, and so we sponsored the WNBA.
And what I learned in that time and in my tenure at that time was that Deloitte really had an opportunity to reach out to women to help tell their stories, right?
And so for me, this was around the 2021, 22, 23 time frame, after COVID, but you know, a couple years ago.
And I swear to you, you you could see the the pre and the and the post or the after of storytelling.
Wow, fans want to see what women are all about off of the court.
That's how people connect.
Yeah, that's why they're not about her.
I love the fact that you swam and and you did extremely well.
And and I and I admire you and how you are.
But if I know that you own an ice cream shop and my daughter loves ice cream, and I'm like, wow, maybe I can and you have maybe franchises or whatever, right?
And so that's how we connect.
It's like, you know what?
She's doing something off.
The court or out of the pool, you know, and so that's something that I can relate to.
So that's what it's all about.
And I think storytelling allows the women to be able to be heard, to be able to say, you know what?
I'm not defined by the the ball or the sport that I do, I'm the defined by what I give to the community.
And that's what storytelling has allowed, I think, the fan base and additional fans to see from the women.
And you think that that was strategically done?
Like, did the players all get together, or did the you know, WMB say, hey guys, you need to start posting more?
You need like I'm just thinking about it from the swim perspective.
That's an area of opportunity for the swimming community.
For sure.
Putting it out there, and you know, we're trying to get on ESPN broadcasts for the first time next year for women.
That's amazing.
So that would be huge, but it's like it's still an uphill battle.
And so we were talking how there's so many parallels between the two, is once people sit their butts down and watch a WMEA game or go, they're like they're hooked because they're just like, this is incredible.
And it's just getting them to that point.
It it's I have to say, you gotta go to a game in order to experience it, right?
You can't just watch it.
So, like you just said, you gotta, it's it's like a progression.
First, you gotta get the fan to turn on the television, right?
You know, once you dial in and turn on the TV and or social media, and because some people are watching it from streaming, right?
Yeah, then you're kind of like, oh, okay, I like that player or I like that team.
Now let me buy a ticket.
Okay, and I go and oh wow, I like this atmosphere.
I like the halftime show.
I like, you know, the way the women, you know, warm up before and after, whatever.
And so now you're it's like building the relationship with the fan.
And seeing that, you know, social media has really helped with that because again, it's like the NBA or the WMBA, they can have like 30 million followers, right?
But uh, but the players, they have 130 million followers.
And it's because the storytelling, it's because, you know, the fans learning about you know women and how important they are on and off of the field or the playing fields.
So yeah, it's it's it's very exciting, but I think a lot of it has to do with the social media and the and that presence that it's brought.
And do you think some people's hesitation, like you know, you're putting it out there, like what would you tell someone, like what would you tell yourself when you're still in the league, like if you were nervous to share?
Because you are putting, you are being vulnerable, you are sharing a piece of yourself with potentially millions of people.
That's a great question.
Like, how do you get it?
That's a great question, you know, just courage to do that.
Yeah, it's so funny.
You're speaking to one of the most private peopons probably in the world.
I am very, very private.
So, and it's only because, and you know this as an athlete yourself, we're always in the limelight.
Someone's always writing an article on us, someone's always doing something that wants to know about our life, right?
And so, like I have my own personal life.
It's like this is this is me, and no, I don't, you know, I don't if I I would I want to share this, if I want to share this.
Um, but I think it's just knowing that people want to connect with you.
And if people don't know your story, how can they connect?
How can they get to learn you as a person beyond your, you know, your again, your sport?
Um one of the things I think that's important that the women are also learning is that they are our brands, they are walking brands.
Yes.
And I think that also, that mindset, right, allows you to understand that people want to buy into you before they buy into anything else.
Before they buy a ticket, they want to know who you are as a person and it can they connect with you.
And so for me, I I think it was just like just saying, you know what, I know I have to share some of my life with my fans, and I'm okay with that, you know, because if if I want them to support the W and me, whether it was a college, they gotta learn about who I am as a person.
So yeah, that's I mean, that's such a good point of you almost become cynical as an athlete where you're like, oh well, people are just gonna have a comment or a judgment.
Right.
It's like that's the loudest voices are the three percent.
You know, it's like but it gets you.
Yes, it does, it does, it does.
That's a great point.
Yeah, yeah.
What's your favorite thing of all the ventures that you're involved in that you're doing right now?
Ooh, wow.
Um, I'll put it out there.
So I um I have aspirations of bringing a WNBA team to Baltimore.
Um that's probably the biggest thing that I'm doing.
Um, and it's already out there.
Um, we've we've met with uh certain politicians uh in the community.
We've gotten and you know uh support from the community, uh residential communities that that are all around you know the Baltimore area.
Um it's out there.
So that's something that I'm working on.
And I think uh because of the explosion of the W, there are many owners that are coming into the pipe, you know, to the to the picture now.
Uh I know a lot of the NBA owners are getting an opportunity to to uh get in on the W side, but I think at some point um it's it's that the league will need to look at, right, um former players that have earned the opportunity, such as myself.
I've I've worn so many hats, like you said.
I've I have my you know, obviously professional athlete, or I wouldn't be in a conversation.
So Olympian, you know, Olympic Sport Festival, but and then overseas, obviously, you know, place so that whole sports.
But then the corporate, you know, side that I've built, you know, five years in Big Pharma, seven years at at Deloitte, which is where Kathy Engelbart was the former CEO at Deloitte.
Um I spent seven years there.
Um, and then my not my nonprofit building that entrepreneurial side.
So for me, um, that's the biggest project that I'm working on.
And I and um and I think Baltimore deserves a uh a team.
We're a sports town.
We're right in between DC and Philly, who is Philly is getting a team, you know, in the next few years, right?
They're gonna be playing in W WMBA uniforms, and that's gonna be exciting.
So we need something in the middle.
Yeah, uh, in between the Philly and the and the DC stretch, and I think Baltimore would be perfect.
That's so do you know I made both my Olympic teams?
I lived in Towson, Maryland.
Yes, yes, you did say that.
Yes, yeah.
So yeah, that's so exciting.
Yeah, it is, it is.
Thank you.
It is very exciting.
And I'm I'm I'm hoping that um that uh you know that the dominoes fall in the right place.
Um, but we certainly have done the work, and I think, you know, one of the things is is is being able to have a a connection to the community.
Um and the fact that I already have basketball camps and I have about 30, you know, camps in the community, and I've done that over since 2009 over the last 16 years.
It's like we're doing it reverse.
Most times they bring a team and then they do the camps and the community activation around it, whereas we already have the community activation, so now we'll we'll put the team hopefully in the actual city.
So yeah, you've done all the groundwork.
All the groundwork.
We're connected to the community.
We we got people that are gonna want to hopefully you know buy those tickets because they're already vested with us anyway.
Yeah, yeah.
Amazing.
Well, I can't wait to see that.
Yeah, yeah, we gotta stay in contact and come back on your show and talk about it.
I love that.
Yeah, we love it.
So, last question true to unfiltered waters forms.
What is a word that motivates you, inspires you, or just encompasses who you want to be on the daily?
Leadership.
I had that locked.
Why leadership?
Because I think it encompasses everything.
I could have said integrity, I could have said kindness, I could have said motivation, you know, I could have said any of those words, but I think to be a leader, right, it encompasses you have you have to be kind, you have to be empathetic, you have to, you uh, you have to have grit, you have to be motivated, right?
You you have to serve, which is what I do a lot.
I serve the community, I serve people.
So for me, it's just leadership, um, and I think that brings it all together for me.
Yeah.
So I aspire to be uh you know a great leader, not having people behind me, but having people beside me.
Um and I think that's what also constitutes leadership.
Yeah, it's a team, yeah, it's a team effort.
So you exemplify that.
Absolutely.
Thank you so much.
I appreciate it.
Yeah, well, thank you so much.
I love this.
Absolutely.
It's been it's been fantastic.
Thank you so much.
Of course.