Brittney Griner Doesn't Want to Leave the U.S. 'Anytime Soon' — Unless It's for the Olympics (Exclusive)
The WNBA superstar tells PEOPLE that international travel is off the table for now — with one notable exception
Evan Millstein
Like many professional athletes, Brittney Griner has had the opportunity to travel the world, playing in front of huge crowds in Brazil, China, Japan, Serbia, Turkey and more. But after a life-changing 10-month Russian detainment, her days of international travel may be few and far between.
“I have no plans on going out of the country right now,” says Griner, 33. “Even coming to New York [from Phoenix] was hard. I kind of broke the first time I came back [to New York] because it’s the last place I was before I left." (Griner had a layover at John F. Kennedy airport in Feb. 2022 before flying to Moscow, where she was arrested.)
"In the hotel, I was just pacing, kind of frantic. It’s better now — way better now.”
Before her imprisonment, which she opens up about in this week's issue of PEOPLE, Griner had been making regular treks to Russia to take advantage of the surging popularity of women’s basketball there, which makes it considerably more lucrative than in the U.S.
“Every sport has an off-season,” the Phoenix Mercury center explains in her new memoir, Coming Home. “But pro women hoopers often work year-round. We earn about 250 times less than NBA players and have a hard cap on our salaries. In the WNBA that year I made around $220,000. Overseas, I earned a million plus. That pay gap is why I was in Russia in the first place.”
Tired of missing home, holidays and her wife Cherelle, Griner had already decided — before her Feb. 2, 2022 arrest at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo airport for possession of two vape pens containing a combined 0.7 grams of hash oil — that it would be her final season with UMMC Ekaterinburg of the Russian Premier League. But since her return in December 2022, the idea of international travel has been a source of anxiety.
Miguel A. Negron/US Army
Brittney Griner steps back onto U.S. soil in San Antonio on Dec. 9, 2022 after 293 days.“My wife and I [used to enjoy going] down to Mexico for a bit,” says Griner, “But now I’m just like, ‘Nah, I can’t do it.' We can go to a beach in America. There’s plenty of beaches here. There were countries I wanted to visit before, but [not] now.”
Griner says if she ever regains a level of comfort with traveling abroad, the trip will be to a “NATO-friendly country” and there will be “a lot of planning and talking” with Cherelle in advance to ensure she never again puts herself in a dangerous position or a situation in which she could be targeted.
One trip she does have in her sights: the Summer Olympics in Paris, which kick off in late July. The opportunity to represent the United States for a third time is the only exception Griner has said she’s willing to make to play overseas. And if she is selected to the 12-woman Team USA roster, she’d be “honored” to accept.
“And I wouldn’t be afraid to travel abroad,” she writes in Coming Home. “ I [know] the same country that brought me home would protect its Olympic athletes.”
Brittney Griner's memoir, Coming Home, with Michelle Burford, is available now.
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