DeWanna Bonner is back in Phoenix and back in the spotlight. The 38-year-old forward shared pictures and videos from a recent modeling shoot on Instagram on Tuesday, April 21, drawing reactions from Angel Reese and Mikayla Timpson as the Mercury prepare for the 2026 season.
Bonner said she had stepped away from basketball and spent some time “in the modeling lane a little bit,” a shift that came after a difficult stretch in 2025. She played nine games for Indiana after signing with the Fever in February 2025, stepped away for personal reasons in June, and was waived on June 25, 2025. Two weeks later, she signed with Phoenix, the team that first made her the fifth overall pick in 2009 and with which she won titles in 2009 and 2014.
The social media response was immediate. Reese and Timpson both left three smiling face with heart-eyes emojis on Bonner’s post, and Bonner answered with heart emojis of her own. One fan wrote, “So beautiful DB 😍 I had to double take, you look like Whitney Houston ❤️❤️❤️,” while another called her “A beautiful black Queen.” The Mercury also chimed in with a simple endorsement: “She’s everything.”
Bonner’s post landed just as Phoenix announced its 2026 training camp roster, making the timing feel less like a side note and more like a return signal. She has already shown she can still shape a season, leading all WNBA reserves in scoring at 10.6 points per game and in steals at 0.9 per game in 2025, then averaging 9.1 points and 6.8 rebounds across 11 playoff games. Her biggest moment came in Game 3 of the WNBA Finals against Las Vegas, when she finished with 25 points and 10 rebounds.
Bonner has been candid about the strain behind the scenes, saying it was “tough” and pointing to cyberbullying, while also crediting her teammates, family and children. That makes the modeling shoot more than a styling detour. It reads as a reset for a veteran who has already won in Phoenix, left, endured a messy exit elsewhere and now appears set to open another chapter where her career began.
