Caitlin Clark isn’t quite the women’s basketball equivalent of Tiger Woods, but there’s a reason she’s been compared to the 15-time major champion.
She brought millions of new eyeballs to a league that had long struggled for mainstream attention. She’s also a marketing juggernaut, with endorsement deals from the likes of Nike, Gatorade and State Farm. But like Tiger in his prime, perhaps the greatest measure of Clark’s star power is that when she’s absent — the audience is, too.
Nothing illustrates that phenomenon better than the WNBA’s national anthem controversy.
All year long, players and coaches from the Atlanta Dream and Golden State Valkyries have been running off the court before the Star-Spangled Banner is played. Then, just after “the home of the brave” is sung, they return to the floor. Neither team has publicly explained why it follows this routine, nor have they said what the players and coaches do during those 90-some-odd seconds. But the wildest part of all this is that, until these WNBA Finals — nobody seemed to notice.
If an NFL or NBA team had engaged in a similar practice during the regular season, it would be one of the biggest sports stories — or even news stories — in the country. Pundits would be regularly weighing in on the matter, activists would be mobilizing, and a nationwide debate on the issue would ensue.
But until now, it had barely even generated a whisper. Do you think that would be the case if the Fever left the court for the anthem?
The answer, of course, is “absolutely not.” The actions of Clark and her teammates would be dissected every day. POTUS would probably comment, and some of those endorsement deals would be in jeopardy. But a Caitlin-free WNBA game simply doesn’t matter to the majority of American sports fans. The scheduled start time for Game 6 speaks to that.
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Monday, it was announced that what could be the final WNBA game of the season will be played at 12:30 p.m. Eastern time on a Thursday. The reasoning is that the Dream wanted a venue change — moving the game from Gateway Center Arena (capacity 3,500) to State Farm Arena (17,000). The problem is that the Hawks are scheduled to play that same day, meaning Game 6 will occur when most Americans are working or in school. Again, it’s hard to believe that happens if Clark and the Fever were involved.
This national anthem mystery is one of the more bizarre sports stories I’ve ever seen. That players and coaches have repeatedly left the court without offering an explanation is strange enough. That it’s taken this long for anyone to notice might be even stranger.
But this is what happens when the league’s true needle-mover isn’t on the court. Caitlin Clark has made the WNBA impossible to ignore. Without her, apparently, it’s still remarkably easy.