Clark has been on the receiving end of some hard fouls and dirty plays since joining the WNBA. A rookie basketball player coming into the league with immense popularity only to be tested and put through the wringer by their opponents is not a new concept. But when that rookie basketball player is white and most of their opponents are Black, it invites discussions about race.
Monday night, Sean Hannity weighed in on the discourse around Clark, inviting OutKick’s Clay Travis and Tomi Lahren onto his Fox News show to offer their perspective.
“It’s not just race though, it’s also sexuality,” Travis claimed. “Caitlin Clark is a white heterosexual woman in a Black lesbian league and they resent and are jealous of all of the attention and the shoe deal that she got. And instead of recognizing the truth, which is great athletes who people care about coming into your league really do get everybody more money…”
“Let me ask you this,” Hannity responded. “Why do you say lesbian league? I mean, I don’t know anything about the sexuality of any of the girls in the WNBA.”
“70% lesbian,” Travis stated. “And I think her having a boyfriend, I think it’s a fiancé, who by the way said there needs to be an enforcer, creates two different identity politics universes that she doesn’t fit in in this league. They don’t like her cause she’s white and they don’t like her cause she’s straight. And as a result, the league is coming undone around her even though she’s bringing in new fans.”
The league is not coming undone as it reaches new heights of popularity. Much of the national media is coming undone as it learns to cover the WNBA on the fly.
Hannity’s question was fair. We don’t know about the sexuality of every WNBA player, nor should we. Travis, however, offered the “70%” statistic as if it was a commonly known fact. In 2017, former WNBA player Candice Wiggins claimed 98% of the league was gay, a number that was quickly disputed. In 2022, a study found 38% of WNBA players were lesbian.
We do know Clark has a boyfriend, who as Travis noted, recently called on the Fever to add an enforcer to their roster following the dirty foul by Chennedy Carter. But there is seemingly no way of knowing the sexual orientation of every WNBA player or even how that statistic might pertain to Clark’s popularity among her peers.
