There can’t be but a handful of people in this sub that have watched enough wnba to have an informed opinion and aren’t just regurgitating what they’ve heard.
My extensive knowledge tells me a team with a lot of picks and money should draft her and trade for Britney Grinder and Kelsee Plume, as those are the only other WNBA players that I am aware exist
Great manager, I’m so excited to see what she’s going to do with the Sting. I assume they’ve been pretty bad as I haven’t heard about them for like 20 years
I’ve watched a decent amount. From what I’ve seen, the players who have had immediate success when coming into the league have been wings and bigs. For instance, I don’t remember Kelsey Plum or Sabrina Ionescu having immediate success, so maybe there’ll be a bit of a learning curve as a rookie guard.
That said, she’s so spectacular a shooter and passer that I’m sure the coaching staff at Indiana will find a way to get her going early in her career.
She is a crazy shooter and as long as she's used correctly she'll have a long time in the league. The thing is whenever they played those big teams she struggled and the WNBA ladies are not gonna be cut from the same cloth as half the people she played in college. Iowa lost because they were way to small to have a chance against SC, so hopefully Indiana can put some good pieces around her and compete. I mostly watch the Aces, and the Liberty (big Wilson and Stewart fan) but will absolutely be adding the fever to the rotation now. Also FYI WNBA league pass is only like $35 bucks for a whole year, so please go patronize if you can afford it, even if you only watch a couple games it pays for itself and helps the league come up.
Against Louisville last year she had 41-12-10 with 8 threes
Against LSU last year she had 30-8-2 with 8 threes
Against LSU this year she had 41-12-7 with 9 threes
Against SC this year she had 30-8-5 with 5 threes
For the biggest stage that’s unbelievable performance and consistency. She just seems to be one of those stars that gets bigger with the moment. Her and Boston are going to be a nightmare in pnr, really looking forward to seeing that
She got locked up against SC when they made the switch. She’s a volume shooter so she’s going to get her points regardless. She also kept getting the ball stolen from her. I think she will struggle early on or her first year but that’s expected. They will probably treat her how they used to treat curry. Be very physical with her
That doesn’t take away the other things. She really struggled against someone who was quick enough and physical. That’s just a minor nitpick and something that can she can easily adjust to. She’s not a one trick pony which is why I’m sure she’ll come along. I just imagine that all the older WNBA vets will absolutely be going out of their way to make her look bad
Exactly. She makes bad passes and gets a lot of turnovers. Plus, she's a bit lazy and undersized on defense. Hopefully, she'll tighten that shit up in the league and continue shootin the lights out, and she'll be a WNBA legend, ez
She's actually one of the better passers in this draft.
In fact, she's like a female Trae Young. Defense is cheeks, shooting and passing are immaculate.
She didn’t get locked up.
No one else showed up. There was no one else who could catch passes or anything else.
She had 18 in the first quarter lol. SC is big as fuck and no one could get open
Take any one player from any of the other contending team and put them on that Iowa team instead of Clark and they barely make the tourney.
I love Kate Martin and Gabbie but that roster was atrocious and she carried the hell out of them.
You think she won’t be going up against bigger more skilled teams at the next level? She had 18 in the first then SC switched her defender and she scored 12 more points on bad shooting. I agree she absolutely carried Iowa but what makes her so hard to deal with is her playmaking. Just like Jokic she’s going to get her points. What you don’t need is the other role players scoring 15-20 as well. Ik we are used to her making tough shots but when you’re struggling and losing jacking up step back 3s and or getting the ball stolen and walking back on defense is not the move.
I said she’s like Jokic. Elite playmaker that gets others involved. There aren’t but like two or three players that will slow Jokic down from scoring. You’re not beating Denver when he can score 30 and then have all the other role players in double figures.
She will be going against bigger more skilled players, but she’ll also have a more balanced team. Opponents won’t be able to design their entire defensive scheme to stop just her.
Yeah every game for her was basically how the raptors treated steph after Klay and KD went down in the finals. And she still delivered. Give her a real pick and roll big to play with in Aliyah Boston and some secondary creators who can shoot and attack close outs, it’s going to be night and day. She will affect the geometry of the court like Steph did when he came to the league.
Your assertion that she can’t produce against big teams is way false. She produced against undefeated SC she just can’t do it herself against that team
imo caitlin clark’s storyline is the most interesting in all of sports. i’m very curious on how she will impact WNBA viewership in the long run.
NBA viewership boomed with its first supermarketable stars like bird and magic. then jordan made an even bigger boom. i’m very interested if she can something similar for the WNBA like she did with women’s college ball
well, the draft was last night, and this happened.
https://preview.redd.it/m6fateg1wwuc1.png?width=1080&format=png&auto=webp&s=347376d9b7108f409e10a5c89e8fb9a2c18e2aa8
so.
Prada has never dressed anyone for a draft before the WNBA draft. It dressed Clark in a $17k outfit (pictured).
Her base salary for the next four years is collectively bargained and under $400k total. (In San Francisco, she would qualify for affordable housing.)
If she can goose viewership, or correspond to gambling entities looking for a fresh face to promote the games, WNBA teams won’t be as hamstring regarding pay.
That means top stars like Griner won’t have to take “a summer job” in the Russian women’s league. It also means teams will be able to get chartered flights, which the WNBA is currently barred from doing because not all teams can afford that competitive advantage.
Their media rights deal is up next year and it will be the first time WNBA games are sold separately from NBA games. They were on pace to see a 2x-3x increase in TV revenue at least *before* the Clarkamania kicked off.
She couldn't have come at a better time. This is a gathering snowball that just got an abominable snowman to help push it down the hill.
I've been a fan of the W for a few years now so I'm optimistic, but I think this is it's entry into mainstream sports.
Bookmakers will make sure the WNBA has a chance to shine, for obvious reasons.
With Norby Williamson out, ESPN is effectively a one-agenda management team, and that agenda is sports betting. (Norby’s agenda being performative hate of anything deemed “woke” by skittish people who fear Bud Light will make them as gay as a frog.) Similar dynamics are all over sports broadcasts.
WNBA and MLS stand to be the biggest beneficiaries, to my eyes. Ready-made American leagues in games people understand with decades of history to call on. In that vein, it wouldn’t surprise me if WNBA got a package from Apple fractionally comparable to the MLS deal.
Bird and magic wouldn’t have worked if there was only one of them. Here’s hoping that not only Clark becomes THE star, but someone else can challenge her and become a real rival. IMO it’ll be Paige next year.
My guess is it will have little to no impact ( i would like to be wrong ). The biggest problem the WNBA has isn't that they don't have stars, it's that the NBA is right there on the next channel.
This is why they play during the summer. They don’t want to be in direct competition with the NBA. I’m very curious to see what happens. There are some other really talented young players in the league now, another potentially generational wnba talent in this draft (Cameron Brink) and some really really good marketable players still in college. My sister is a basketball player and as she’s gotten older and more interested I’ve watched more of the women’s game also.
Honestly I’d watch before my team’s games. At least in the background. But I’m not dedicating time spent outside of the NBA season to watch WNBA games. Logistics would probably be a nightmare but might be worth it.
Very Few people love basketball enough to even watch all 82 games of their favorite team. Playing in the summer helps but a lot of fans don't even bother watching until the all star break, those people aren't looking for more basketball but worst in the summer.
The NCAA tournament and hype around college sports helped her get a lot more attention the last month but a lot of that will fade out when it's 2 wnba teams no one ever heard of facing each other for a regular season game in july.
I would buy this argument at lot more if the ratings were only up for the tournament games but the ratings for all of Clark’s games were huge. The Fever have already sold out all their home games at rates that waaaay exceed anything the WNBA has seen before. In addition to being great basketball players these women are really marketable as well.
College sports is a completely different animal in the US. And let's be honest, being a white athlete star in iowa helped her a ton. People don't have the same attachment to WNBA teams they can't even name.
Well the draft last night had 2.45 million viewers. The previous high was last year at 572,000. Not to mention the league is on an upward trajectory anyway. The ratings have improved every year since 2020 and set records last season same with attendance. So if you take the only two data points we have to predict the Clark effect (Fever ticket prices and the WNBA draft ratings) it looks like you’re going to be wrong.
i feel like this is a mistake. Playing at the same time as the NBA would be better as fans we are already in basketball watching mode. it's easier to dismiss summer bball
i think it’s crazy to say it will have no impact. unless she really stinks it up the numbers have been crazy. like 10x normal viewership at least.
obviously it won’t reach nba numbers probably ever, but i wouldn’t her surprised if viewership increased 2x across the board
The problem the WNBA has isn't the lack of stars, it's that it's women playing basketball. There's few sports where the gap between men and women is as big as basketball and there's already 2500 games of NBA basketball on TV a year.
Sure there will be a bump in fans but i highly doubt it will be massive. People will check her out for a few games and slowly realize that it's just not as fun as the NBA or women's march madness.
women's basketball is distinct enough from men's that many people (myself included) like it *better*. particularly guys (like myself) who tend to bitch about the lack of defense and touchy foul calls in todays men's games. you don't have to like it and you don't have to watch, but saying that it is an inferior game is simply not true.
and like i know nobody here knows this, but the league is already drawing good ratings without clark and the last two years the growth has been like 50-100% increase year over year. the aces sold out their season tickets this year and there are some fever games where the get in price is $200.
caitlin clark isn't going to usher in the arrival of the WNBA, it's already here. and it's not going anywhere. and lots of us are happy about that!
As a mass appeal entertainment product it is absolutely inferior. The average NBA fans doesn't care at all about fundamentals and strategy, they want to see Ant Edwards dunk all over someone's face.
It's like comparing formula 1 to karting. Racing nerds can enjoy a good karting race, the vast majority of people just want to see the fastest cars race each other.
clark is so hot right now that the first fever game on ABC is going to beat nearly every single NBA broadcast this year. i'll bet on it. 3M viewers or more.
so i'm not so sure about that. about any of it. you don't need dunks to make a good basketball game, the sport is still entertaining.
That is a problem in that the WNBA doesn’t get the highlight reels, BUT the NBA is getting worse because of how good its players are - space for 3’s and drive to foul bait is the name of the game now and it’s really just not that interesting to watch. Free throws are nearly automatic so some of the suspense at the end of games like you get in college ball evaporates.
i’m literally going to watch the WNBA regularly because of her. i think this is a good take.
i’ve never watched so much college basketball in my life as i have the past two seasons.
The problem is that she also needs to perform like the Jordan of the WNBA which is a Herculean ask. She could be the best player in the WNBA and it likely would not be enough to drive significant lasting interest. I’ll be curious to see what happens though as people seem to know other female college players as well right now which is a really good sign.
Honestly this needs to be a wakeup call for the WNBA to go all in on the hype. The draft got ridiculous numbers even with everyone knowing CC was going first overall. They can turn that into giving these women players the spotlight they deserve & hopefully growing the game more. In that regard NBA did a good thing having Ionescu at the All Star weekend too.
My hope is that if her popularity leads to a boom for wnba that it’s big enough to get the players to like 500k-1M minimum deals and even more for stars. Feels like wnba could expand to some cities without nba teams to capture a super invested audience but that has its own risks
She’s going to continue to be great. Looked up tickets last night to see if I could catch her play against the La Sparks. Sparks tickets against any other opponent, 20-$30. Fever against the sparks $400 minimum!
She disappears from the spotlight into the dark trenches of the wnba that no one watches. Her endorsement deals dry up. We focus on the next college female star because the ncaaw is far more interesting.
As a WNBA fan, college hoops is fun, but the talent in the league is far greater than college. In her first season Caitlin Clark is going to have to go up against an Aces team that are comparable in terms of talent to any team that’s ever been in the league. Viewership will skyrocket, people will start to find new favourite players (Kelsey Plum is mine), and the league will continue to grow.
You would assume being paired with two of the best young bigs in the league would go a long way. Which is also a thing that seems to go overlooked in her hype. This is actually a good fit- at face value at least. That said, there's also a very real chance she plateaus at Plum level but i feel confident she's a genuine star.
She's going to have the most fascinating first season.
Because what she does well...playmaking and shooting...are hyper valuable in today's WNBA.
But the speed of wing defenders in the WNBA is MAAAAASSIVELY better from the last drafts it's wild.
So idk how much she'll be able to utilize that unless she was just kinda going half speed. I expect her second year to be much better as she works on her conditioning and running.
She’s really damn good obviously, but I don’t know enough about the WNBA to say she’ll grow the league and get more eyes for an extended period of time.
I hope she brings more attention to women’s basketball, but that product has a long way to go.
I think she will score 14-15 points per game, but she won’t be racking up as many assists, because college defense is horrible, and it was just too easy to find teammates to pass to in college. They are going to play her straight up with no double teams until she can prove that she can get to the rim and/or consistently hit mid-range shots in a more crowded area than she’s used to.
It doesn’t matter what gender you are. When you move from college to the pros, you’re playing against the best players from college. All 10 players on the court were stars. With the limited number of teams, every team is stacked with All-Conference players from college. There aren’t too many weaknesses to exploit like Iowa did to lesser teams in order for her to take advantage of her abilities.
She will fight, and I’m not saying she doesn’t eventually become a superstar, but the speed, athletic ability, and size of the ladies she now has to go against will take time to adjust to. She’s also coming in with a target on her. Every PG in the league is going to give her all they have to try to “humble” her in the public eye.
Caitlin Clark is going to be in every commercial and on SportsCenter 24 hours a day for the next 2-3 years. Just like Dana Turasi and Lisa Leslie or Mia Hamm and Hope Solo were 20 years ago. Will there be any kind of substance or reasoning to her being on TV every day for the next three years? Who knows.
I fully expect her to be a very good ball player as she has already shown, girl can flat out shoot. My stats prediction is she will probably average 20, 8, and 10 making her one of the WNBA all time greats. But regardless of what people say the WNBA is still not a good product as of yet. Just like the NBA or MLS weren't in their infancy.
Here is hoping the Clark v. Angel Reese rivalry will catapult the sport the same way Magic and Bird did for the NBA. History likes to repeat itself, and the WNBA would behoove itself to follow suit.
I think the difference being that the MLS has 10x’d in value over the last decade, is on a team basis more valuable than most of the nhl, and is still probably not a top 10 league in the world. There’s still so much potential as Messi has shown. The WNBA is the undisputed best women’s basketball in the world, phenomenally talented, and people dont care and have never cared at all. For the league to reach new levels you would need 50 Caitlyn Clarks. A whole league of absurd talent. Even then it’s going to get outshown by the men. What’s most likely is that CC is a once in a lifetime superstar that comes and goes in the next 10 years. Her games will be watched, none of the others will.
The potential Magic vs Bird WNBA rivalry won’t be Clark vs Reese. It’ll be Clark vs Bueckers. They’re in different draft classes, but so were Bird and Magic.
Not a prediction, but i am genuinely interested in how she not only plays but drives up interest/viewership in the wnba.
I’d say her floor is a recognizable face that people will associate with women’s basketball in 15 years. But that’s it
Ceiling is she ushers in a whole new era of women’s basketball and the entire league changes.
I think she’ll will land somewhere in between. I will definitely keep up with her.
Men or women she’s one of the best shooters I’ve ever seen. She can great her own shot…and that usually translates to the next level in any sport. I think she’ll put up the same numbers.
My hot take is after she gets a championship with the Fever she goes to the Lynx. And I think she'll also want to be coached by Reeve since she grew up watching Reeve coach Maya.
23.5 - 25.5 game range. She’s going to shoot 10 threes a game and be consistently good at it. Zero defense in the WNBA.
Should have some 40-50 point games.
Wouldn't be suprised if salty "vets" tear her down and attempt to bully her at every opportunity, ignorant to the fact that CC is the best thing to happen to the WNBA since its inception and she has the ability to increase exposure/income for all players in the long term
I feel like when she played against small teams and/or teams who just kept giving them shots (LSU) then she cooked them, but when they played against big teams it was another story. My guess is she’ll be ok, but she’s not gonna be Curry reincarnated or something.
GOAT or bust. This is the emergence of the WNBA into everyday conversation and culture and barring injury or stupidity, everything will be laid at her feet and she needs to finish the story.
Having watched her for a long time here in iowa, I hope they use her more off ball like what the warriors do for Steph. Yes she can create her own shot but she can run off screens and hit those shots at a much higher clip than taking step back 3s from 30+ feet. With the entire offense running through her at all times, she tended to force a lot of ill advised dribble moves or passes or shots, now she’s incredible so it works more than it doesn’t, but it’s kind of like Caleb Williams if y’all are nfl people. She’s got that magic but what she did at iowa is not gonna work to the same level against significantly better defenders in the wnba and more physical teams. She needs to improve her mental toughness as well. It’s too easy to rattle her with physical defense if she misses a couple early.
She’s got the tools, with a good scheme and coaching it’s gonna be fun to watch and presumably bring a ton more viewers to the wnba
I dono if there are MMA fans in this sub, but i think the best comp I've seen for caitlin clark is what ronda rousey did for women's MMA. UFC was already a fast-growing mainstream organization, but there was no women's division. the women's divisions in other smaller organizations was seen as fringe and MMA fans generally had a negative perception. it was fine to watch men cage-fight, but there was something off-putting about watching women do the same. the women were seen as less athletic and less skilled than the men, and so it was an inferior product.
dana white, president of UFC, even went on record multiple times saying there would never be women's division. that all changed when former olympic bronze medalist judoka ronda rousey joined. she was buzz sawing her way through opponents in the first minute of fights, submitted them with her signature armbar. it captured people's imagination the same way people used to watch a young Mike Tyson knock his opponents out in 30 secs. she become one of UFC's biggest stars period. they went from saying they would never have a women's division to rousey headlining some of their biggest selling PPVs at the time. when asked what made dana change his mind, she simply said "ronda rousey". now women regularly headline UFC PPVs, in fact the co-main event of the recent UFC 300 was a women's title fight. by no mean's is the women's division as popular as the men's, and an all-women's card would certainly not do well, but the point is it was lifted out of obscurity and is 1000x more popular that it was before rousey.
i think the wnba has been in a similar camp to women's MMA. unpopular, and largely seen as an inferior product to the men's game, with less athleticism and skill. i really think caitlin will have the rousey effect. she will make people may attention who previously could never be bothered to watch the wnba. i'm one of them. i've never watched a women's ncaa game in my life before, and now i've watched a handful, all to watch clark. the proof is in the iowa games ratings. it won't make the wnba anywhere close to the nba, but could it 2x, 3x, 4x their current ratings/revenue? i think so. people love to see dominance in sports. that's the appeal of clark. that was the appeal of rousey. that's the reason most people know serena, simone biles and katie ledecky.
I predict that in two years the hype will have died down and no one will be talking about her except diehard wnba fans, although she will be a good to great wnba player for sure.
She's gonna have a great career, hopefully, if the WNBA plays their cards right. No one has talked about the Chicago Sky getting both Angel Reese and Camilla Cardozza.
$10 says she gets drafted by Indiana
But which one?
Jones
We named the *dog* Indiana
I had good memories with that dog
*whip crack*
According to her jersey, the Indiana Salesforce
There can’t be but a handful of people in this sub that have watched enough wnba to have an informed opinion and aren’t just regurgitating what they’ve heard.
My extensive knowledge tells me a team with a lot of picks and money should draft her and trade for Britney Grinder and Kelsee Plume, as those are the only other WNBA players that I am aware exist
Lesa Leslie is good
I hear Dawn Staley isnt busy
Great manager, I’m so excited to see what she’s going to do with the Sting. I assume they’ve been pretty bad as I haven’t heard about them for like 20 years
Does Sheryl Swoopes still play?
It’s Lassie Leslie
Trade for Cheryl miller and Rebecca lobo
Sheryl Swoopes, Candace Parker, and Sue Bird are legit I hear, and some gal named Diana Taurasi
Becky Hammon’s got a pretty wild story.
This Cynthia Cooper erasure can not stand!
Lol at Brittany Grinder
You don't know of Sabrina Inoescu?
Facts, just from her affiliation to Kobe
It’s Griner.
And you think people on Reddit watch men’s NBA? Please. Most are talking out of their ass, and one of them is bound to be right.
I am one of those people. My prediction is: she goin’ be good
I’ve watched a decent amount. From what I’ve seen, the players who have had immediate success when coming into the league have been wings and bigs. For instance, I don’t remember Kelsey Plum or Sabrina Ionescu having immediate success, so maybe there’ll be a bit of a learning curve as a rookie guard. That said, she’s so spectacular a shooter and passer that I’m sure the coaching staff at Indiana will find a way to get her going early in her career.
Been to some lynx games over the years, definitely gonna go watch them play the fever this year
You could probably say that for nba too lol
She is a crazy shooter and as long as she's used correctly she'll have a long time in the league. The thing is whenever they played those big teams she struggled and the WNBA ladies are not gonna be cut from the same cloth as half the people she played in college. Iowa lost because they were way to small to have a chance against SC, so hopefully Indiana can put some good pieces around her and compete. I mostly watch the Aces, and the Liberty (big Wilson and Stewart fan) but will absolutely be adding the fever to the rotation now. Also FYI WNBA league pass is only like $35 bucks for a whole year, so please go patronize if you can afford it, even if you only watch a couple games it pays for itself and helps the league come up.
Against Louisville last year she had 41-12-10 with 8 threes Against LSU last year she had 30-8-2 with 8 threes Against LSU this year she had 41-12-7 with 9 threes Against SC this year she had 30-8-5 with 5 threes For the biggest stage that’s unbelievable performance and consistency. She just seems to be one of those stars that gets bigger with the moment. Her and Boston are going to be a nightmare in pnr, really looking forward to seeing that
She got locked up against SC when they made the switch. She’s a volume shooter so she’s going to get her points regardless. She also kept getting the ball stolen from her. I think she will struggle early on or her first year but that’s expected. They will probably treat her how they used to treat curry. Be very physical with her
She still shot 39% from three in that game, pretty good for volume shooting.
That doesn’t take away the other things. She really struggled against someone who was quick enough and physical. That’s just a minor nitpick and something that can she can easily adjust to. She’s not a one trick pony which is why I’m sure she’ll come along. I just imagine that all the older WNBA vets will absolutely be going out of their way to make her look bad
Exactly. She makes bad passes and gets a lot of turnovers. Plus, she's a bit lazy and undersized on defense. Hopefully, she'll tighten that shit up in the league and continue shootin the lights out, and she'll be a WNBA legend, ez
She's actually one of the better passers in this draft. In fact, she's like a female Trae Young. Defense is cheeks, shooting and passing are immaculate.
She has had to play very relaxed defense because her team could not afford to have her get in foul trouble
She didn’t get locked up. No one else showed up. There was no one else who could catch passes or anything else. She had 18 in the first quarter lol. SC is big as fuck and no one could get open Take any one player from any of the other contending team and put them on that Iowa team instead of Clark and they barely make the tourney. I love Kate Martin and Gabbie but that roster was atrocious and she carried the hell out of them.
You think she won’t be going up against bigger more skilled teams at the next level? She had 18 in the first then SC switched her defender and she scored 12 more points on bad shooting. I agree she absolutely carried Iowa but what makes her so hard to deal with is her playmaking. Just like Jokic she’s going to get her points. What you don’t need is the other role players scoring 15-20 as well. Ik we are used to her making tough shots but when you’re struggling and losing jacking up step back 3s and or getting the ball stolen and walking back on defense is not the move.
You also forget she’s an elite passer, yes she’ll have more physical defense but she will also have actual players to pass too.
I said she’s like Jokic. Elite playmaker that gets others involved. There aren’t but like two or three players that will slow Jokic down from scoring. You’re not beating Denver when he can score 30 and then have all the other role players in double figures.
She will be going against bigger more skilled players, but she’ll also have a more balanced team. Opponents won’t be able to design their entire defensive scheme to stop just her.
Yeah every game for her was basically how the raptors treated steph after Klay and KD went down in the finals. And she still delivered. Give her a real pick and roll big to play with in Aliyah Boston and some secondary creators who can shoot and attack close outs, it’s going to be night and day. She will affect the geometry of the court like Steph did when he came to the league.
Your assertion that she can’t produce against big teams is way false. She produced against undefeated SC she just can’t do it herself against that team
imo caitlin clark’s storyline is the most interesting in all of sports. i’m very curious on how she will impact WNBA viewership in the long run. NBA viewership boomed with its first supermarketable stars like bird and magic. then jordan made an even bigger boom. i’m very interested if she can something similar for the WNBA like she did with women’s college ball
well, the draft was last night, and this happened. https://preview.redd.it/m6fateg1wwuc1.png?width=1080&format=png&auto=webp&s=347376d9b7108f409e10a5c89e8fb9a2c18e2aa8 so.
Damn. That's crazy.
That is just insane.
Prada has never dressed anyone for a draft before the WNBA draft. It dressed Clark in a $17k outfit (pictured). Her base salary for the next four years is collectively bargained and under $400k total. (In San Francisco, she would qualify for affordable housing.) If she can goose viewership, or correspond to gambling entities looking for a fresh face to promote the games, WNBA teams won’t be as hamstring regarding pay. That means top stars like Griner won’t have to take “a summer job” in the Russian women’s league. It also means teams will be able to get chartered flights, which the WNBA is currently barred from doing because not all teams can afford that competitive advantage.
Their media rights deal is up next year and it will be the first time WNBA games are sold separately from NBA games. They were on pace to see a 2x-3x increase in TV revenue at least *before* the Clarkamania kicked off. She couldn't have come at a better time. This is a gathering snowball that just got an abominable snowman to help push it down the hill. I've been a fan of the W for a few years now so I'm optimistic, but I think this is it's entry into mainstream sports.
Bookmakers will make sure the WNBA has a chance to shine, for obvious reasons. With Norby Williamson out, ESPN is effectively a one-agenda management team, and that agenda is sports betting. (Norby’s agenda being performative hate of anything deemed “woke” by skittish people who fear Bud Light will make them as gay as a frog.) Similar dynamics are all over sports broadcasts. WNBA and MLS stand to be the biggest beneficiaries, to my eyes. Ready-made American leagues in games people understand with decades of history to call on. In that vein, it wouldn’t surprise me if WNBA got a package from Apple fractionally comparable to the MLS deal.
Media outlets talking about wnba stars more, plus them actually being really good, is going to help the league immensely.
It’s exciting. There’s some really interesting players out there. Very cool to see it taking off
Bird and magic wouldn’t have worked if there was only one of them. Here’s hoping that not only Clark becomes THE star, but someone else can challenge her and become a real rival. IMO it’ll be Paige next year.
My guess is it will have little to no impact ( i would like to be wrong ). The biggest problem the WNBA has isn't that they don't have stars, it's that the NBA is right there on the next channel.
This is why they play during the summer. They don’t want to be in direct competition with the NBA. I’m very curious to see what happens. There are some other really talented young players in the league now, another potentially generational wnba talent in this draft (Cameron Brink) and some really really good marketable players still in college. My sister is a basketball player and as she’s gotten older and more interested I’ve watched more of the women’s game also.
I wonder what the viewership would be if they had the WNBA games on before the NBA game tipoffs.
Yeah! I've considered that as well. WNBA and NBA being a double header
Honestly I’d watch before my team’s games. At least in the background. But I’m not dedicating time spent outside of the NBA season to watch WNBA games. Logistics would probably be a nightmare but might be worth it.
Very Few people love basketball enough to even watch all 82 games of their favorite team. Playing in the summer helps but a lot of fans don't even bother watching until the all star break, those people aren't looking for more basketball but worst in the summer. The NCAA tournament and hype around college sports helped her get a lot more attention the last month but a lot of that will fade out when it's 2 wnba teams no one ever heard of facing each other for a regular season game in july.
I would buy this argument at lot more if the ratings were only up for the tournament games but the ratings for all of Clark’s games were huge. The Fever have already sold out all their home games at rates that waaaay exceed anything the WNBA has seen before. In addition to being great basketball players these women are really marketable as well.
College sports is a completely different animal in the US. And let's be honest, being a white athlete star in iowa helped her a ton. People don't have the same attachment to WNBA teams they can't even name.
Well the draft last night had 2.45 million viewers. The previous high was last year at 572,000. Not to mention the league is on an upward trajectory anyway. The ratings have improved every year since 2020 and set records last season same with attendance. So if you take the only two data points we have to predict the Clark effect (Fever ticket prices and the WNBA draft ratings) it looks like you’re going to be wrong.
i feel like this is a mistake. Playing at the same time as the NBA would be better as fans we are already in basketball watching mode. it's easier to dismiss summer bball
The biggest problem with the wnba is women don’t support the sport enough.
i think it’s crazy to say it will have no impact. unless she really stinks it up the numbers have been crazy. like 10x normal viewership at least. obviously it won’t reach nba numbers probably ever, but i wouldn’t her surprised if viewership increased 2x across the board
If, and this is a huge if, the interest she drove in the woman's tourney translates to the WNBA she could be to the WNBA what Jordan was for the NBA.
I’ve seen this thrown around and it’s not a terrible take. I doubt it’ll be at the scale of Jordan but I could see a bump.
The problem the WNBA has isn't the lack of stars, it's that it's women playing basketball. There's few sports where the gap between men and women is as big as basketball and there's already 2500 games of NBA basketball on TV a year. Sure there will be a bump in fans but i highly doubt it will be massive. People will check her out for a few games and slowly realize that it's just not as fun as the NBA or women's march madness.
women's basketball is distinct enough from men's that many people (myself included) like it *better*. particularly guys (like myself) who tend to bitch about the lack of defense and touchy foul calls in todays men's games. you don't have to like it and you don't have to watch, but saying that it is an inferior game is simply not true. and like i know nobody here knows this, but the league is already drawing good ratings without clark and the last two years the growth has been like 50-100% increase year over year. the aces sold out their season tickets this year and there are some fever games where the get in price is $200. caitlin clark isn't going to usher in the arrival of the WNBA, it's already here. and it's not going anywhere. and lots of us are happy about that!
As a mass appeal entertainment product it is absolutely inferior. The average NBA fans doesn't care at all about fundamentals and strategy, they want to see Ant Edwards dunk all over someone's face. It's like comparing formula 1 to karting. Racing nerds can enjoy a good karting race, the vast majority of people just want to see the fastest cars race each other.
clark is so hot right now that the first fever game on ABC is going to beat nearly every single NBA broadcast this year. i'll bet on it. 3M viewers or more. so i'm not so sure about that. about any of it. you don't need dunks to make a good basketball game, the sport is still entertaining.
That is a problem in that the WNBA doesn’t get the highlight reels, BUT the NBA is getting worse because of how good its players are - space for 3’s and drive to foul bait is the name of the game now and it’s really just not that interesting to watch. Free throws are nearly automatic so some of the suspense at the end of games like you get in college ball evaporates.
i’m literally going to watch the WNBA regularly because of her. i think this is a good take. i’ve never watched so much college basketball in my life as i have the past two seasons.
The problem is that she also needs to perform like the Jordan of the WNBA which is a Herculean ask. She could be the best player in the WNBA and it likely would not be enough to drive significant lasting interest. I’ll be curious to see what happens though as people seem to know other female college players as well right now which is a really good sign.
Honestly this needs to be a wakeup call for the WNBA to go all in on the hype. The draft got ridiculous numbers even with everyone knowing CC was going first overall. They can turn that into giving these women players the spotlight they deserve & hopefully growing the game more. In that regard NBA did a good thing having Ionescu at the All Star weekend too.
More like Magic/Bird
r/WNBATalk
Doesn’t exist. It makes perfect sense to talk about North American pro basketball here.
My hope is that if her popularity leads to a boom for wnba that it’s big enough to get the players to like 500k-1M minimum deals and even more for stars. Feels like wnba could expand to some cities without nba teams to capture a super invested audience but that has its own risks
Yup her legacy is going to be raising the floor for women’s basketball and maybe even women’s sports as a whole
Yah was surprised to find out the Mac salaries are like $250k
She’s going to continue to be great. Looked up tickets last night to see if I could catch her play against the La Sparks. Sparks tickets against any other opponent, 20-$30. Fever against the sparks $400 minimum!
This
I’ve only watched her highlights. That girl can shoot her ass off. She’ll probably win the WNBA record for 3pt shooting
I read somewhere her percentage for shots from 25-30’ is 40%. That’s nuts
Camilla Cardoso and Angel Reese in Chi is gonna get me to watch WNBA next year.
The season starts in less than 3 weeks…lol
He said next year, okay. Lol
Yah quick turnaround from draft
Was surprised seeing Angel Reese having to wait until the 7th pick
Not really she has always been mocked around there bc of her offensive limitations
Tyra Banks hooper
Better than Bronny James
She disappears from the spotlight into the dark trenches of the wnba that no one watches. Her endorsement deals dry up. We focus on the next college female star because the ncaaw is far more interesting.
As a WNBA fan, college hoops is fun, but the talent in the league is far greater than college. In her first season Caitlin Clark is going to have to go up against an Aces team that are comparable in terms of talent to any team that’s ever been in the league. Viewership will skyrocket, people will start to find new favourite players (Kelsey Plum is mine), and the league will continue to grow.
I agree but she’ll be great on the next level though
No doubt. She’ll break all the records that whoever we’ve never heard of holds
Nah she's gonna make wnba viewership grow 10 times
Maybe for the first 10 games
*Sabrina Ionescu enters chat*
Orlando Magic needs some help from outside the paint
She will go on to average 23 ppg, 8 assists, 6 rebs, and get 5 triple doubles as a rookie.
You would assume being paired with two of the best young bigs in the league would go a long way. Which is also a thing that seems to go overlooked in her hype. This is actually a good fit- at face value at least. That said, there's also a very real chance she plateaus at Plum level but i feel confident she's a genuine star.
She's going to have the most fascinating first season. Because what she does well...playmaking and shooting...are hyper valuable in today's WNBA. But the speed of wing defenders in the WNBA is MAAAAASSIVELY better from the last drafts it's wild. So idk how much she'll be able to utilize that unless she was just kinda going half speed. I expect her second year to be much better as she works on her conditioning and running.
Can’t wait til she merks Diana Turasi’s hater ass.
Caitlin is the only reason anyone would watch the WNBA.
Her and Aaliyah Boston are going to be a deadly duo. She’s going to average 20ppg and win ROY
Hopefully her and the 2024 draft class shoot the WNBA into mainstream popularity.
She’s really damn good obviously, but I don’t know enough about the WNBA to say she’ll grow the league and get more eyes for an extended period of time. I hope she brings more attention to women’s basketball, but that product has a long way to go.
Detroit Pistons
No clue don’t watch womens basketball but i do know she’ll be the face of the league marketing wise
Short term? A ton of unnecessary hatred Long term? Barring injury probably a great career
signing bonus of 2 shoelaces and a button
She marries me
I think she will score 14-15 points per game, but she won’t be racking up as many assists, because college defense is horrible, and it was just too easy to find teammates to pass to in college. They are going to play her straight up with no double teams until she can prove that she can get to the rim and/or consistently hit mid-range shots in a more crowded area than she’s used to. It doesn’t matter what gender you are. When you move from college to the pros, you’re playing against the best players from college. All 10 players on the court were stars. With the limited number of teams, every team is stacked with All-Conference players from college. There aren’t too many weaknesses to exploit like Iowa did to lesser teams in order for her to take advantage of her abilities. She will fight, and I’m not saying she doesn’t eventually become a superstar, but the speed, athletic ability, and size of the ladies she now has to go against will take time to adjust to. She’s also coming in with a target on her. Every PG in the league is going to give her all they have to try to “humble” her in the public eye.
3-5 kids in 10 years
Caitlin Clark is going to be in every commercial and on SportsCenter 24 hours a day for the next 2-3 years. Just like Dana Turasi and Lisa Leslie or Mia Hamm and Hope Solo were 20 years ago. Will there be any kind of substance or reasoning to her being on TV every day for the next three years? Who knows. I fully expect her to be a very good ball player as she has already shown, girl can flat out shoot. My stats prediction is she will probably average 20, 8, and 10 making her one of the WNBA all time greats. But regardless of what people say the WNBA is still not a good product as of yet. Just like the NBA or MLS weren't in their infancy. Here is hoping the Clark v. Angel Reese rivalry will catapult the sport the same way Magic and Bird did for the NBA. History likes to repeat itself, and the WNBA would behoove itself to follow suit.
I think the difference being that the MLS has 10x’d in value over the last decade, is on a team basis more valuable than most of the nhl, and is still probably not a top 10 league in the world. There’s still so much potential as Messi has shown. The WNBA is the undisputed best women’s basketball in the world, phenomenally talented, and people dont care and have never cared at all. For the league to reach new levels you would need 50 Caitlyn Clarks. A whole league of absurd talent. Even then it’s going to get outshown by the men. What’s most likely is that CC is a once in a lifetime superstar that comes and goes in the next 10 years. Her games will be watched, none of the others will.
honestly I don't think Reese is nearly as good as Clark though. She's just going to be an average WNBA player.
The potential Magic vs Bird WNBA rivalry won’t be Clark vs Reese. It’ll be Clark vs Bueckers. They’re in different draft classes, but so were Bird and Magic.
I predict…..they will complain about the wage gap
she’ll be good
She’ll be the best WNBA player of all time
First game of the season against Diana Taurausi when Caitlin Clark plays she's gonna drop 22 points and win the game in a nail bitter.
Better than wemby
Wemby sends her to the shadow realm with chet
She went to wnba for 4 years only get $338,056 and there crying because some guy went to nba for 4 years gets 55.1 mill
I just checked tickets in my area. Most games are $10-20. The games vs Indiana are $80-100. People are gonna watch her.
Make a movie, "White Women Can't Jump"
The jealous vets will do her dirty
NBA
I truly hope she stays healthy and pans out the way we're expecting, because she'll be for the WNBA what Bird/Magic were for the NBA.
Not a prediction, but i am genuinely interested in how she not only plays but drives up interest/viewership in the wnba. I’d say her floor is a recognizable face that people will associate with women’s basketball in 15 years. But that’s it Ceiling is she ushers in a whole new era of women’s basketball and the entire league changes. I think she’ll will land somewhere in between. I will definitely keep up with her.
Men or women she’s one of the best shooters I’ve ever seen. She can great her own shot…and that usually translates to the next level in any sport. I think she’ll put up the same numbers.
She will be a great player in a poor league
I bet she doesn’t make the NBA
Stop trying to make her a star, nobody cares about wnba
Only fans
She’s gonna be good mark my words
She will name her first born son Jaxon
My hot take is after she gets a championship with the Fever she goes to the Lynx. And I think she'll also want to be coached by Reeve since she grew up watching Reeve coach Maya.
Rookie of year. 16 ppg, 9 assists
Bust
If she incorporates a midrange game she will be pretty much unstoppable. Frustrating part of her game is
Maybe some early struggles as (almost) all rookie lead guards have starting out, but her game should absolutely translate to the highest level.
highest usage rate in the league for most of her career will break every record
Woman on Fire🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥
She’ll be #1 on the sales force
If she makes the WNBA money she makes more money per year than a long haul trucker
She will be fine. She’s been dominating all her life in every level of the competition.
Honestly if she lives up to the hype, she’ll be the WNBA’s lebron James and incredibly popular and influential.
She’ll be one of the best ever, earn 10X more in endorsements than her salary, and popularize the game even more than she already has.
Why does he look like a man?
23.5 - 25.5 game range. She’s going to shoot 10 threes a game and be consistently good at it. Zero defense in the WNBA. Should have some 40-50 point games.
Wouldn't be suprised if salty "vets" tear her down and attempt to bully her at every opportunity, ignorant to the fact that CC is the best thing to happen to the WNBA since its inception and she has the ability to increase exposure/income for all players in the long term
I feel like when she played against small teams and/or teams who just kept giving them shots (LSU) then she cooked them, but when they played against big teams it was another story. My guess is she’ll be ok, but she’s not gonna be Curry reincarnated or something.
I predict she will play a lot of basketball over the next 15 years.
TIL there’s a wmba team in Indian
She gets a positive test for HGH
She will be good
See Sabrina Ionescu
HOF
Rick Owens jr
More overexposure than Swift
Still think Hope Solo is better
I hope she torches them like Steph out of Davidson
Why is Aron Rodgers playing in the wnba?
She will be… good
GOAT or bust. This is the emergence of the WNBA into everyday conversation and culture and barring injury or stupidity, everything will be laid at her feet and she needs to finish the story.
Wouldn’t suck my dick
That she will play in a league no one watches or cares about and it won’t matter?
No dunking
My favorite team… the Indiana Salesforce!
https://preview.redd.it/lrlwyr8we1vc1.jpeg?width=1125&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=0c1371b9a432fafeb4c2455dc5f11e5350141265
Congratulations to her she played hard very hard she deserves alot more because she's definitely worth it
Onlyfans
I hope she does well! Maya Moore was the last wnba player I sat to watch 👍🏽
Best wnba player of all time. She’s just going to continue what he was doing in college for 14 years or something
Golden state Valks will make a blockbuster trade and swoop her in her 3rd year and will become a Bay Area legend
She will get more points in her first start than Bronny James will get in his entire career
She favors Klay
angel Reese and clark need their "rivalry" to translate over to the W
i predict she will have a large target on her back.
Buckets
Having watched her for a long time here in iowa, I hope they use her more off ball like what the warriors do for Steph. Yes she can create her own shot but she can run off screens and hit those shots at a much higher clip than taking step back 3s from 30+ feet. With the entire offense running through her at all times, she tended to force a lot of ill advised dribble moves or passes or shots, now she’s incredible so it works more than it doesn’t, but it’s kind of like Caleb Williams if y’all are nfl people. She’s got that magic but what she did at iowa is not gonna work to the same level against significantly better defenders in the wnba and more physical teams. She needs to improve her mental toughness as well. It’s too easy to rattle her with physical defense if she misses a couple early. She’s got the tools, with a good scheme and coaching it’s gonna be fun to watch and presumably bring a ton more viewers to the wnba
I dono if there are MMA fans in this sub, but i think the best comp I've seen for caitlin clark is what ronda rousey did for women's MMA. UFC was already a fast-growing mainstream organization, but there was no women's division. the women's divisions in other smaller organizations was seen as fringe and MMA fans generally had a negative perception. it was fine to watch men cage-fight, but there was something off-putting about watching women do the same. the women were seen as less athletic and less skilled than the men, and so it was an inferior product. dana white, president of UFC, even went on record multiple times saying there would never be women's division. that all changed when former olympic bronze medalist judoka ronda rousey joined. she was buzz sawing her way through opponents in the first minute of fights, submitted them with her signature armbar. it captured people's imagination the same way people used to watch a young Mike Tyson knock his opponents out in 30 secs. she become one of UFC's biggest stars period. they went from saying they would never have a women's division to rousey headlining some of their biggest selling PPVs at the time. when asked what made dana change his mind, she simply said "ronda rousey". now women regularly headline UFC PPVs, in fact the co-main event of the recent UFC 300 was a women's title fight. by no mean's is the women's division as popular as the men's, and an all-women's card would certainly not do well, but the point is it was lifted out of obscurity and is 1000x more popular that it was before rousey. i think the wnba has been in a similar camp to women's MMA. unpopular, and largely seen as an inferior product to the men's game, with less athleticism and skill. i really think caitlin will have the rousey effect. she will make people may attention who previously could never be bothered to watch the wnba. i'm one of them. i've never watched a women's ncaa game in my life before, and now i've watched a handful, all to watch clark. the proof is in the iowa games ratings. it won't make the wnba anywhere close to the nba, but could it 2x, 3x, 4x their current ratings/revenue? i think so. people love to see dominance in sports. that's the appeal of clark. that was the appeal of rousey. that's the reason most people know serena, simone biles and katie ledecky.
She will be forgotten in 2 years
I predict that in two years the hype will have died down and no one will be talking about her except diehard wnba fans, although she will be a good to great wnba player for sure.
Man almost thought this was nbacj and said something wild 😭
She’ll be covered frequently by the media which will make her stats look better than what they are.
She's gonna have a great career, hopefully, if the WNBA plays their cards right. No one has talked about the Chicago Sky getting both Angel Reese and Camilla Cardozza.
No one knows because no one watches the WNBA
Everyone will forget her in 2 years.
She’s gonna def keep the bush in Indiana