Few athletes in the history of sports have withstood the level of scrutiny and adoration simultaneously that surrounds basketball superstar Caitlin Clark. She has seemingly single-handedly elevated the profile of women’s sports at a time when the trans-athlete debate threatens to shred Title IX in the high school and collegiate ranks while dealing with issues of race in her transition to professional sports. Through it all, though, Clark has brought prosperity and fans to her sport that might not be there otherwise. Christine Brennan is the award-winning USA Today columnist and author of the new book, “On Her Game: Caitlin Clark and the Revolution in Women’s Sports”. She appeared on 710 WOR’s Mendte in the Morning program to discuss why Clark has become perhaps the most interesting figure in America- not just sports- today.
Brennan told host Larry Mendte that Clark brings a combination of passion and energy to her sport that few athletes can offer: “You know, I’ve covered a lot. I’ve been so fortunate in my career: Tiger Woods, Olympics, Super Bowls. And I was kind of like, huh, this is something new and different, certainly seeing a woman playing that way, with reckless abandon, with the speed, the passes. She’s really, of course, a basketball player, but she’s really an entertainer- the high-wire act, and I think that’s what I try to get at throughout the book, and I think that is the allure for so many millions of people.”
The book focuses on the past two years in Clark’s career, her last year at the University of Iowa and her polarizing rookie year in the WNBA. Brennan says the league could have handled her arrival better: “I deal with all of that and unfortunately the WNBA, to me anyway, just did not seem to be prepared for the moment, wasn’t anticipating it, and certainly wasn’t anticipating the national scrutiny that they have received.”
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