Starbird Will Get $150,000 In First Season

Stanford basketball star Kate Starbird, a Tacoma native, has signed a three-year contract with the Seattle Reign of the American Basketball League. She reportedly will be paid $150,000 next season.

Starbird, 21, a two-time All-American and winner of the 1997 Naismith Award as the nation’s top college women’s player, will be the Reign’s regional draft pick in the first round of the ABL draft May 5.

In another development, the Reign traded 1988 Olympian Cindy Brown to the new expansion team in Long Beach, Calif., in exchange for a second- or third-round draft pick. She averaged 17.5 points last season.

The 6-2 Starbird was welcomed to town by Mayor Norm Rice and Microsoft spokesman John Pinette, who gave her a laptop computer.