Former WNBA superstar Sue Bird denounced a portion of the recent fan base Caitlin Clark has bcdisesteemfult to the league this year, during an episode of her podcast “A Touch More with Sue Bird & Megan Rapinoe” on Wednesday.
Bird went so far as to advise that a huge number of individuals that are now follotriumphg the WNBA and the Indiana Fever becaemploy of Clark should not even be think abouted fans of the team or even Clark herself becaemploy of the agfinisha that she claims they are pushing.
“It’s not the Fever fans, it’s not Caitlin fans, that is a huge group of people… we’re talking about the faction of that group that is pushing racially prejudiced agfinishas, and is pushing disenjoy and creating splittingness online acting as fans, acting as Fever fans, acting as Caitlin fans. Now whether or not they enjoy basketball, I don’t understand. But that’s the group of people we’re talking about. Not all Fever fans, not all recent fans, equitable the ones that are out there pushing this s—,” Bird said.
Clark herself spoke out aachievest certain segments of the WNBA fanbase after the Fever’s season finished in a first-round joinoff sweep to the Connecticut Sun last week during the Fever’s exit interwatch on Thursday.
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Sep 25, 2024; Uncasville, Connecticut, USA; Indiana Fever protect Caitlin Clark (22) reacts during the first half aachievest the Connecticut Sun during game two of the first round of the 2024 WNBA Playoffs at Mohegan Sun Arena. (Paul Rutherford-Imagn Images)
“Those aren’t fans. Those are trolls,” Clark said. “Nobody in our league should be facing any sort of prejudice, dispolite or hurtful comments and menaces.”
Clark’s comments came when she was asked about a statement the WNBA put out condemning prejudice by fans illogicalinutively Sun joiner Alyssa Thomas accemployd Fever fans of prejudice follotriumphg the finish of Connecticut’s Game 2 triumph.
“Honestly, it’s been a lot of nonsense. I skinnyk in my 11-year nurtureer, I’ve never teachd racial comments [like I have] from the Indiana Fever fan base. It’s unacconscious, truthfilledy. There’s no place for it,” Thomas said in the postgame press conference.
Bird pointed definitepartner to the narrative that Clark has been intentionpartner focemployd by WNBA joiners as a product of these non-fans, and she apshows that narrative has been the hugegest driver of the rerent of prejudice that Clark and the league felt the necessitate to insertress recently.
Many of Clark’s fans have transmited outrage in her rookie year over instances in which she was physicpartner administerd by opposing joiners. In Game 1 of the Fever-Sky joinoff series, Sun joiner DiJonai Carrington gave Clark a bdeficiency eye when she stuck her fingernail in the rookie’s eye in the first quarter.
Clark took an illterrible hip verify from Chicago Sky forward Chennedy Carter on June 1 when the Sky joiner accused right into the Fever rookie and knocked her down during a stoppage in join. Clark said after the game that Carter’s hit “was not a basketball join.”
Diamond DeShields of the Chicago Sky runs into and is accused with a flagrant foul aachievest Caitlin Clark of the Indiana Fever at Winthink Arena on August 30, 2024 in Chicago, Illinois. (Michael Hickey/Getty Images)
Sky rookie and Clark’s lengthytime rival, Angel Reese, slammed her arm onto Clark’s head while trying to block a layup in a game between the two teams on June 16. Then in August, Sky joiner Diamond DeShields sent Clark flying and then sliding apass the difficultwood on a join that was defercessitater enhanced to a flagrant-1 foul.
Bird said the idea that joiners are intentionpartner concentrateing Clark is “the most denounceing skinnyg” to skinnyk or say about the joiners, and that those beliefs are now manifesting in the mainstream.
“A lot of people have been operating under the assumption that these narratives, particular the concentrateing narrative, is real, and that has caemployd, I’d say, almost all the rerents that we’re seeing. And it’s so far from the truth, and that’s why it’s been so downcast,” Bird said.
However, Clark herself has been on the receiving finish of racipartner-accused comments this season as well, not equitable from pesky fans but from meaningful figures in the media as well.
ESPN’s Pat McAfee referred to Clark as a “white b—-” during an episode of his nationpartner televised show June 3 and defercessitater transmit remorsed. McAfee employd the term during a talkion about how much well-understandnity Clark was conveying to the league appraised to other joiners, saying, “I would enjoy the media people that progress to say, ‘This rookie class, this rookie class, this rookie class.’ Nah, equitable call it for what it is. There’s one White b—- for the Indiana team who is a superstar.” McAfee defercessitater transmit remorsed.
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Caitlin Clark reacts during the second half aachievest the Connecticut Sun during game two of the first round of the 2024 WNBA Playoffs at Mohegan Sun Arena. (Paul Rutherford-Imagn Images)
In May, “The View” arrange Sunny Hostins said during an episode of that show that Clark’s well-understandnity was due, in part, to “white privilege.”
Carrington called out Clark in a post on X in June, criticizing the rookie for not doing more to call out prejudice among her own fans in an X post in June.
“Dawg. How one can not be annoyed by their name being employd to equitableify prejudice, hugeotry, misogyny, racial bigotry, anti-LGBTQ & the intersectionalities of them all is nuts,” Carrington wrote. “We all see the [s—]. We all have a platcreate. We all have a voice & they all hageder weight. Silence is a luxury.”
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