Through the first few weeks of her WNBA, Caitlin Clark has had to battle through some adversity. While praising the Indiana Fever rookie for what she's done, one analyst might have gone a bit over the top.
On his daily ESPN TV show on Monday, Pat McAfee did a segment called "Guess the WNBA Rookie." At the start of his rant about Clark, the longtime NFL punter used explicit language to describe her.
"Just call it for what it is. There’s one white bitch for the Indiana team who is a superstar," McAfee said. "We think the WNBA, more specifically their refs, need to stop trying to screw her over at every single turn.
"What you have is somebody special, and we're lucky she's here in Indiana."
Following her historic run at Iowa, the bar was set extremely high for Caitlin Clark upon entering the WNBA. She's put together multiple strong outings for the Fever (2-9). Clark is averaging 15.6 points, 5.1 rebounds and 6.4 assists per game.
Pat McAfee thinks Caitlin Clark should be center of WNBA media attention
The basis of Pat McAfee's argument regarding Caitlin Clark has to do with WNBA media attention as a whole. He feels the scope has been on the rookie class as a whole when instead it should be focused on the Fever guard.
Before he went off the rails with his description of Clark, McAfee started the segment comparing her to Angel Reese and Cameron Brink. They both were fellow top picks of the WNBA draft and have helped the increased popularity of the league.
McAfee started by looking at the national TV ratings for the three players' teams. Clark and the Fever had nearly triple the viewership of Reese and the Chicago Sky, who were in second. As for Brink and the LA Sparks, they were a distant third.
After that, McAfee looked at how many times each of the rookies has been in a top five game in terms of TV ratings. Clark led the way with four, followed by Brink with two and then Reese was in last with zero.
While McAfee was trying to say what a big draw Caitlin Clark is, Brink and Reese are among the top first-year players in the league. Brink continues to dazzle for the Sparks with her impressive two-way play, and Reese is averaging just shy of a double-double.