The Chicago Sky are moving on from Chennedy Carter after electing not to extend a qualifying offer to the dynamic guard. Carter is now an unrestricted free agent and can begin negotiations with other teams.
After initially joining the Sky on a training camp contract, Carter fought her way into the starting lineup last season. The fourth-year guard often served as the sole source of offense for the Sky, especially after the departure of Marina Mabrey in a July trade. Carter averaged 17.5 points per game and single-handedly accounted for a quarter of the Sky’s scoring after the All-Star break.
If Carter was so integral to the Sky offense, why didn’t the team even attempt to re-sign the guard? The Sky’s decision not to re-sign Carter hinges on two key factors: offensive style of play and locker room identity.
The offense can’t function the way it did last season. The Sky were the second-lowest-scoring team in the league, posted the second-worst offensive rating and made the fewest 3-pointers. Most importantly, they failed to properly funnel their offense through rookie stars Angel Reese and Kamilla Cardoso, producing a stagnancy inside the arc that only deepened with their lack of shooting behind it.
Carter mostly functioned as a bandage to these problems — she scored points, created shots out of nothing and forced the Sky to pick up the pace in transition. But her style of play deviated sharply from the ideal system for the Sky. Carter doesn’t take 3-pointers. She required the fourth-highest usage rate (28.4) in the league to sustain her scoring, which meant the Sky’s offense catered heavily to isolation guard play that left Cardoso and Reese disengaged and uninspired on the offensive end.
This offseason, Carter has been successful in the Women’s Chinese Basketball Association, averaging 31.2 points per game on 51% shooting for Wuhan Shengfan. But her style of play hasn’t shifted, requiring 24.6 shots per game to sustain that level of scoring while shooting only 23.8% from deep.
Should the Chicago Sky re-sign Chennedy Carter in restricted free agency?
The Sky can’t afford another non-factor behind the arc in their starting rotation alongside Cardoso and Reese. And they need to improve the team’s length and on-ball facilitation, which would have been a sizable challenge with an undersized two-guard already on the slate. Carter’s fit for the Sky was further eroded by her perceived role in the dissolution of trust within the locker room of former coach Teresa Weatherspoon, who was fired in October after her first season as a head coach in the WNBA.
Carter is talented enough to compete at the highest level in the WNBA, but no offense in the league would function properly if it followed the formula that the Sky employed for her last season. If Carter wants to find her footing in the WNBA, she will need to adapt her on-ball ethos to encompass more pick-and-roll play while also improving her 3-point shooting accuracy.
Restricted free agency is only the first step of the WNBA free agency process. Teams could extend qualifying offers — a one-year contract with a slight increase from the prior season’s salary — and core designations to restricted free agents between Jan. 11 and Monday. Any restricted free agent who did not receive a qualifying offer by Monday joins the remainder of the unrestricted free agents in the league for open negotiations on Tuesday.
The Sky did extend qualifying offers to restricted free agents Michaela Onyenwere, Dana Evans and Nikolina Milić. If no other team provides a higher offer to either player, they will return to Chicago or function as trade assets as the front office looks to maneuver a crucial rebuilding year with new head coach Tyler Marsh.
The Sky are expected to re-sign Onyenwere, who has been a crucial locker room leader in addition to a journeyman wing player who can step in as a starter in a pinch. They could also bring back Evans — who lost the starting point guard role again last season but still shows promise as a potential secondary guard — or more likely utilize her in a trade to continue building a stronger backcourt.
Milić was acquired as part of a trade last April to secure the No. 7 draft pick but has not played in the WNBA since 2023.
With this first step completed, the Sky are approaching an integral point in the offseason as they join the race for top free agency and trade targets like Jewell Loyd. The next two months will determine the foundation of the roster for Marsh’s debut season as the front office prepares for another crucial draft — and an even more pivotal 2026 free agency window.