Caitlin Clark has the chance to quiet the toxic behavior of the worst of her fans.
Clark and fellow WNBA All-Star captain Napheesa Collier will choose their teams for the 2025 All-Star Game, scheduled for July 19, and the Indiana Fever star would send an emphatic message by drafting Angel Reese. The teams will be chosen live Tuesday, July 8 at 7 p.m. ET on ESPN.
The Chicago Sky forward has been cast as the villain to Clark’s hero dating back to their junior years in college, when Reese waved her ring finger at Clark after LSU beat Iowa in the NCAA championship game. Whether Reese was taunting or mimicking Clark’s own “You can’t see me” diss didn’t matter. A rivalry was born.
Sports thrive on rivalries. Brady vs. Manning. Yankees vs. Red Sox. Warriors vs. Cavaliers. And in the closest comparison to Clark and Reese, Magic vs. Bird.
But there’s an ugly undertone to Clark and Reese’s rivalry that’s an issue for everyone in the WNBA. There is a segment of Clark’s fans — not all of her fans, not the majority of her fans, but too many — who have styled Clark as some kind of white, heteronormative savior and are using her as a vehicle for racism and homophobia.
Again, not all her fans. But enough that it’s doing real damage. Any player who delivers a hard foul on Clark can expect their social media accounts to be flooded with hateful messages. Reese has talked about being the subject of pornographic deep fakes, some of which were sent to her family members.
And woe to anyone who says something mildly critical about Clark or her game. (Or, God forbid, votes her the ninth-best guard during a season in which she’s missed half of Indiana’s games and is not shooting particularly well.)
“In my 11-year career, I’ve never experienced the racial comments (like) from the Indiana Fever fan base,” Alyssa Thomas said during last year’s playoffs, after the Connecticut Sun eliminated the Fever following a contentious series that included DiJonai Carrington being accused of trying to maim Clark.
“It’s unacceptable, honestly, and there’s no place for it,” Thomas continued. “We’ve been professional throughout the whole entire thing, but I’ve never been called the things that I’ve been called on social media, and there’s no place for it. Basketball is headed in a great direction, but we don’t want fans that are going to degrade us and call us racial things.”
Clark has disavowed this segment of her fan base, directly and indirectly. Her harshest condemnation came in Time’s athlete of the year profile last year.
“Just stop,” she told the magazine. “Because that’s not who I am.”
Yet the trolls and bigots persist, and no one gets more abuse than Reese.
She was disparaged when the WNBA said it was investigating racist abuse during the Sky and Fever’s first game in Indianapolis this season, and mocked when the league said it could not substantiate the comments. Fans coined the term “mebounds” to diminish her game, the suggestion being Reese is the WNBA’s leading rebounder (12.8 per game) only because she’s grabbing her own misses.
But if Clark picks Reese for her All-Star team, it could silence some of the howling chorus of awfulness. The folks saying Reese sucks or flooding her social accounts with vitriol might pipe down if they see she has Clark’s endorsement. The folks who think they’re supporting Clark with their nastiness might think twice when Clark herself gives a public seal of approval.
There will some who will continue to be awful because they’re just awful people. (If your criticism of a player becomes personal or is thinly disguised racism and/or homophobia, you’re a bad person. Sorry, not sorry.) But Clark and Reese being on the same All-Star team — connecting on the court, laughing together and high-fiving one another — could show the still persuadable folks this animosity is the stuff of their own imaginations and it’s time to move on.
All-Star Games are, by their very nature, silly. There’s little, if anything, at stake, and players tend to treat it as a glorified exhibition. All of which is fine! But wouldn’t it be nice if this All-Star Game was the catalyst for defanging the WNBA’s worst fans and making the league, once again, a place to simply enjoy basketball?
No matter who Clark picks, she’s going to have a good team for the All-Star Game. By drafting Reese, she could have a team that’s good for the entire game and everyone in it.
Follow USA TODAY Sports columnist Nancy Armour on social media @nrarmour.