I’m Sorry, WHO Are You Again? (or, “In Defense of Caitlin Clark’s Time Magazine Athlete of the Year Award”)

Rightly or wrongly, I had never known of Sheila Johnson’s existence until this past Friday. Apparently she’s the co-owner and CEO of Salamander Resort Hotels (which I also had never heard of), though I would have more reason to know her as the co-founder of cable channel BET, and now I know that she’s a co-owner of the WNBA’s Washington Mystics franchise, the NBA’s Washington Wizards franchise, and the NHL’s Washington Capitals franchise. She also is apparently the nation’s first Black woman to become a billionaire, and she’s investing in the arts, according to this CNN article. So she is quite obviously a highly accomplished person, and she deserves recognition for the positive things she’s done in her life.

That said… even including her ownership stake in the Mystics, who is she and why do I give a shit what she has to say about Time Magazine awarding Caitlin Clark with their Athlete of the Year title?

Don’t bother clicking that last link unless you really want to; I’ll give you the gist of it. She’s complaining that the other stars in the WNBA don’t get enough attention, even going so far as to claim that Time should have put the entire league’s roster on the cover, and she’s claiming that focusing on the white woman will fuel division among the players and racism overall.

Here’s how we know that’s bullshit.

First of all, the racial disparity already does exist, but it didn’t start just now, and it isn’t actually rooted in media coverage or sponsorships. It’s rooted in the response that racist dumbfucks had toward Angel Reese’s use of Caitlin Clark’s own taunts against her in the 2023 NCAA Women’s Basketball Championship game. Racists, who were racist before this event and remain racists to this day, have a problem with the Black girl for doing exactly the same thing that the white girl regularly does… and winning the championship title against the white girl on top of that. They made Caitlin Clark something of their own cause… which Clark herself has explicitly rejected in no uncertain terms:

“I don’t think Angel should be criticized at all,” Clark said. “No matter which way it goes, she should never be criticized for what she did. I’m just one that competes, and she competed. I think everybody knew there was going to be a little trash talk. It’s not just me and Angel. I don’t think she should be criticized, like I said. LSU deserves it. They played so well. Like I said, I’m a big fan of hers.”

When it comes to racist and misogynistic behavior from fake “fans” of the WNBA (who are actually Nazi right-wingers who hate women altogether, but hate Black women even more), Clark has explicitly called out the racism:

“People should not be using my name to push those agendas. It’s disappointing. It’s not acceptable,” Clark said Thursday when asked about the comments. “… Treating every single woman in this league with the same amount of respect, I think, it’s just a basic human thing that everybody should do.”

And in the context of this Time Magazine award, she even said in Time’s interview with her that not only does she recognize the racism — in both the fake fandom and the media attention that she gets — but the racism is also something that she’s actively trying to fight by highlighting the accomplishments of her Black colleagues and heroes:

“I want to say I’ve earned every single thing, but as a white person, there is privilege,” says Clark. “A lot of those players in the league that have been really good have been Black players. This league has kind of been built on them. The more we can appreciate that, highlight that, talk about that, and then continue to have brands and companies invest in those players that have made this league incredible, I think it’s very important. I have to continue to try to change that. The more we can elevate Black women, that’s going to be a beautiful thing.”

So the racism is already a thing, and Clark has always spoken out against it.  The problem isn’t Time Magazine naming her as Athlete of the Year, the problem is the racists who see her as “The Great White Hope” of the WNBA.

Secondly, even if the media coverage of Caitlin Clark had nothing to do with race whatsoever, she would still be deserving of it. Skin color had nothing to do with why she was the first player to get drafted in her class.  Skin color had nothing to do with why Angel Reese went seventh in the same draft class.  Angel Reese has not had the same level of accomplishment that Caitlin Clark has, either in the NCAA or the WNBA, even though she has a ring that Caitlin Clark doesn’t.  And while Angel Reese is an incredibly talented player in her own right, she doesn’t have the court vision, playmaking capabilities, or shot selection and accuracy that Caitlin Clark does.  Nobody in the WNBA at the moment has the same skill set or level of talent that Caitlin Clark does.  She is the single best player in the league right now.

But that’s not all.  Competition breeds improvement among all those involved.  Everyone else in the league has had to step up their game, and they have.  The level of play in the WNBA — and women’s basketball altogether — has been steadily increasing over the past 20 years or so already, but the arrival of Clark was a wake-up call that told everyone else they’ll need to really push hard against her.  The Indiana Fever may have fallen short of the Finals this year, but nobody can deny that playing against them, with Clark on the court, forced both the champion New York Liberty and the runner-up Minnesota Lynx to play at a higher level.  Because she plays at a higher level.  They had to overcome that to beat the Fever, both in the regular season and the playoffs.

That increased level of competition, fueled by Caitlin Clark’s level of play, has undeniably brought more people into the fandom.  Clark may have been the player that attracted all the attention in the first place, but all of the teams and all of the players have made new fans, young and old, because those eyeballs were on the league this year.  The 2024 WNBA season was the most-watched of all time, and the 2024 WNBA Finals — in which, again, Caitlin Clark didn’t even play — saw the highest TV ratings for the series since 1999.

And I don’t mind telling you: the level of competition in the WNBA in 1999 was nothing like what it is today.  I know this because I watched my Miami Sol get dragged up and down the court for 40 minutes in each game the following season, and I remember thinking “this isn’t good basketball on either side of the court.”

Though, for the record, I want my team back, and I’ll be damned if fucking Jacksonville gets one before Miami does. Thankfully, Miami is on the list of cities the league is considering in its expansion plan, so even if Jacksonville wrongfully gets a team first, there’s at least some valid hope that Miami will get one eventually.

But I digress.

So by all accounts, the rising tide is lifting all the boats.  The Caitlin Clark Effect is rightly rooted in her highly impressive talent, and the buzz that she generated has led to incredible growth and opportunities for both the league and all of its athletes.  And yes, of course all of the players deserve praise for their accomplishments.  I’m even including the 8-and-32 L.A. Sparks in that.  Because these women are the best in the country, the continent, the hemisphere, and without exaggeration, perhaps even the world.

But none of them did more to bring that long-overdue and well-deserved attention to the league than Caitlin Clark did just by her sheer talent alone, and nobody had more of an impact on American sports altogether this year than Caitlin Clark. That’s indisputable fact.

Now, where did Sheila Johnson’s Washington Mystics finish this past season?

Oh.  Right.

The media hype was taking place all season long. Hell, the media hype started all the way back in Iowa last year. I didn’t hear Sheila Johnson saying jack about it this entire time. I didn’t hear Sheila Johnson saying jack about anything this entire time. As stated previously in this article, I had never even heard of Sheila Johnson until she decided to use the news of Time Magazine naming Caitlin Clark their Athlete of the Year to make some noise.

Which isn’t atypical, even for we sports fans. We don’t care who owns the teams unless and until they do something stupid or establish a pattern of losing. We only know who Donald Sterling is because, not only were the L.A. Clippers the joke of the NBA under his ownership, but he was also a raging racist piece of shit. I only know and care that Stephen M. Ross owns the Miami Dolphins because he bought them from H. Wayne Huizenga, who bought them from Joe Robbie’s family, and the team has been mediocre ever since the Robbie family sold it. On rare occasions, we know who the owners are because of good things they’ve done, like minority owner Derek Jeter removing that God-awful mechanical home run sculpture from the Miami Marlins’ stadium (pissing off ex-owner Jeffrey Loria in the process… which gives Jeter bonus points in my book, because Loria was a shitty owner in and of himself). But for the most part, it’s negative press that tells us who owns a team. When a team’s owner isn’t making the news, that’s a good thing.

Sheila Johnson making the news as part-owner of the Washington Mystics is not a good thing. This comes off as sour grapes, concern trolling, and jealousy masquerading as complaints about fairness. If she had been vocal about this from the beginning, it could be argued that she’s raising valid concerns.  But no, she spoke up only now because Caitlin Clark was given an accolade at the end of a season in which Johnson’s own team sucked wind just to keep up.

Spare me.