Jason Whitlock: “Caitlin Clark's dad spoke for all of us Saturday afternoon. From his seat inside Carver-Hawkeye Arena he shouted two words to his talented and electrifying daughter. Clark’s father tells her to “shut up” and stop complaining to officials.
Clark and the number one Hawkeyes were playing 16-seeded Holy Cross, and Clark had spent a significant portion of the game focused on arguing with the refs. Frustrated by the smothering defensive attention Holy Cross deployed to slow the best women's college basketball player, Caitlin whined to the refs on nearly every other trip down the court. It was a bad look for the player I affectionately call ‘Show White’, the biggest star in all of college athletics. She looks spoiled and entitled. I give her dad credit for recognizing it and trying to address it. Her dad can see what I can see and what everybody can see.
Caitlin Clark is in the process of destroying the reputation and perception, that combined with her uncanny shot-making made her the most fascinating story in all of sports... Probably since Tiger Woods won the Masters in 1997. For the past year Clark has walked the line of carrying herself with just enough swagger and bravado to grab your attention, and just enough likability and humility to make you love her.
I love Caitlin Clark. She's made me a fan of women's college basketball. Saturday, however, was the first time I started to have reservations. Saturday was the first time that I pondered whether all the national commercials, the name, image, and likeness money, and all the adulation had turned ‘Show White’ into just another spoiled and entitled jock. I have to admit, some people spotted this ugly trend long before I did. Perhaps I was too caught up in defending Clark from her bigoted and jealous critics and I couldn't see that Clark has some Johnny Manziel tendencies. Foolishly, I thought a young woman from Iowa wouldn't act as arrogantly as a Texas quarterback, but money, fame, and social media corrupt the same in Iowa as it does in Texas. At this point it's quite clear Caitlin Clark isn't much different from Colorado quarterback Shedeur Sanders. You guys remember, Shedeur that gets all up in everybody's face and points to his watches?... Hopefully, the difference might be the two dads. Caitlin’s dad sees the problem and is apparently trying to correct it. Deion Sanders thinks his son walks on water, and his son can dictate where he plays in the NFL.
The glut of money that has flooded into professional and college sports has made it nearly impossible to disciple young athletes. You can't lead them anywhere. You can only beg them to follow and that's about it. They're child TV and movie stars. Fame may have already stolen Caitlin Clark from those of us looking for sports stars who remind us of the so-called ‘good old days.’ My whole love affair with women's college basketball is driven by my attempt to find a replacement for the NBA and men's college basketball. The NBA is unwatchable. The players don't care about the regular season, and it's way too much isolation basketball mixed with jacking up three-pointers. In the college game, the transfer portal and young players turning pro early – they've ruined men's college basketball. I thought the women's game might fix my basketball jones, however, I'm not sure if its traction and relevance will be sustained. Clark is headed to the WNBA this summer and I'm highly unlikely to watch that. The players in the WNBA are just as entitled and they're constantly whining.
This weekend I watched Southern California freshman Juju Watkins. She is going to be great. She might even be better than Caitlin Clark, but it won't be long before she falls to money and fame just like everyone else. She's managed by Klutch Sports... Rich Paul, you know, LeBron James's agency? Watkins will likely turn into an angry ‘Black Lives Matter’ advocate, and I'll be cooked. I've probably just had a brief fling with women's hoop. I can already see the breakup.
I’m telling you, I’m nuts over women's hoops and that's why I'm so disappointed. I'm not enjoying Caitlin Clark as much as I thought I would. I was never a big Angel Reese fan; she carries herself in a way that’s hard to watch too. I'm watching women's basketball and I'm watching them act like the men, and I'm watching them play a much slower game below the rim and it's like ‘no.’ Part of your allure is your attitude. You're not like the guys, and so that makes me put up with the fact that you don't dunk the ball and you don't move as quickly. It's just about the competition. Everywhere I look from Caitlin Clark it's like she's just like Johnny Manziel, she's just like Shedeur, and we already knew Angel Reese was a bit much. I don’t know.”
Watch Jason Whitlock of Blaze TV’s Fearless explain why he thinks his love affair for Iowa Hawkeyes women’s basketball superstar Caitlin Clark might be over, as Whitlock says Clark is starting to come off as ‘just another spoiled and entitled jock.’
During no. 1 seed Iowa’s uncomfortably close victory over 16-seeded Holy Cross on Saturday, Clark spent much of the game complaining to the officials after nearly every possession, with at one time TV cameras spotting Clark’s father in the crowd shouting at her daughter to ‘shut up’, and to stop berating the referees. Whitlock believes Clark's antagonistic behavior towards the officials is starting to rub fans the wrong way, and that she's coming off like a petulant child when things aren't going her way.
Check out the segment above as Whitlock believes Clark’s insufferable and melodramatic on-court antics may alienate a portion of her fan base that will now see her just as another ‘Johnny Manziel’ or ‘Shedeur Sanders’, and a formerly beloved young athlete who polluted much of their innocent charm and appeal by becoming arrogantly out of touch.
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