SUE BIRD is an American professional basketball player who played for the Seattle Storm of the Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA). Bird was drafted by the Storm first overall in the 2002 WNBA draft and is considered to be one of the greatest players in WNBA history.

As of 2021, Bird is the only WNBA player to win titles in three different decades. She held a front office position for the NBA’s Denver Nuggets as their Basketball Operations Associate. She has also played for three teams in Russia. Her family is from Israel and she has both American & Israeli citizenship.

In high school, she was the New York State Player of the Year, the New York Daily News Player of the Year, and a WBCA All-American. In her senior year on the undefeated University of Connecticut team in 2002, she won the Wade Trophy and the Naismith Award as College Player of the Year. She finished her UConn career ranked first in three-point field goal percentage and free throw percentage, second in assists and steals, and as a three-time winner of the Nancy Lieberman Award as the top point guard in the nation, while leading her team to a record of 114–4.

Bird has won a joint-record four WNBA championships with the Storm (2004, 2010, 2018, 2020), a historic five Olympic gold medals (2004, 2008, 2012, 2016, and 2020), two NCAA Championships with UConn (2000, 2002); and four FIBA World Cups (2002, 2010, 2014, 2018). She is one of only 11 women to attain all four accolades. She is also a five-time EuroLeague Women champion (2007-2010, 2013). During her WNBA career, she has been selected to twelve WNBA All-Star teams and eight All-WNBA teams. Additionally, she was voted by fans as one of the WNBA’s Top 15 Players of All Time in 2011, was voted into the WNBA Top 20@20 as one of the league’s top 20 players of all time in 2016, and was voted into The W25 as one of the league’s top 25 players of all time in 2021. Her fifth Olympic gold medal, at the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo, makes her one of only two Olympic basketball players—of either gender—ever to win five gold medals, with the other player being her US Olympic teammate Diana Taurasi.

Bird publicly came out as a lesbian in July 2017, revealing that she had been dating soccer player Megan Rapinoe for several months. In 2018, she and Rapinoe became the first same-sex couple on the cover of ESPN The Magazine‘s “Body Issue”. They announced their engagement in October 2020.

Bird confirmed her retirement from basketball in June 2022.