Days after his comments about Caitlin Clark’s greatness — or lack thereof — ESPN’s Jay Williams attempted to clarify his comments.
Clark recently became the greatest scorer in NCAA women’s basketball history and is on track to become the greatest scorer — women or men — in NCAA basketball history. Shortly after, Williams offered some interesting commentary, saying “I am unwilling…to say that she is great yet. I think she’s the most prolific scorer the game has ever seen. I hold great, or the levels of immortality or the pantheon, to when you win championships.”
Naturally, that comment drew some debate.
On Wednesday, Clark and Dave Pasch were on the call for LSU’s thrilling win over Kentucky. During the second half of that game, Pasch and Williams reopened the discussion about Clark.
Jay Williams on Caitlin Clark (again):
"I hear people talking about GOATS. For me, I'm like, "OK, you wanna be a GOAT. Fine. There's level of greatness. You gotta win championships to be GOATS…Championships. That's how we measure greatness overall." pic.twitter.com/1inUByFmtc
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) February 22, 2024
“We were talking about greatest. I hear people talk about GOATS. For me, I’m like, ‘OK. You want to be a GOAT? Fine. There’s level of greatness. You gotta win championships to be GOATS. When people want to dawn her as the greatest of — I’m like, ‘Let’s slow down.’ I’ve seen Diana Taurasi. I’ve seen Breanna Stewart. You can sit here and tell me all day long, ‘Well, she’s played with other great players.’ OK. Great. Championships. That’s how we measure greatness overall.”
Pasch then asked Williams for clarification. “So, you’re saying she’s a great player? But you’re not putting her in the pantheon of the greatest of all time until she wins a title?”
“Yes. And that’s my opinion. That’s OK. I just, we qualify Tom Brady the best at winning championships.”
Williams’ comments were not universally slammed. He had people backing his opinion.
So what is he saying that’s so wrong? The only issue I have is him not bringing up Maya Moore’s name first https://t.co/M3nThIsM2x
— Henny ♎️ (@CamronSanto) February 22, 2024
https://twitter.com/JothamKitara/status/1760532312020971566
But by and large, the general feeling was that Williams had again missed the mark.
Steph Curry never won anything in college. I think we all knew he had the ability to be great.
Clark & Curry are very similar in that we never really quite saw that level of shooting talent before. And I'd argue that Clark is more highly regarded at this point in their careers https://t.co/qLt4zJKwUs
— Joe (@ByJoeDavis) February 22, 2024
Jay Williams the last few days: https://t.co/8wrUgQBkmg pic.twitter.com/ErG6G5jUjZ
— Saulzy15 Cards (@Saulzy15) February 22, 2024
Jay Williams needs to STFU: https://t.co/Sn1EvdHENn
— bmaz ( also at bsky and mstdn ) (@bmaz) February 22, 2024
The arrogance and almost obsession for Jay Williams to always want and need to be in the news cycle is a choice https://t.co/qOaaDn9mjE
— John Lund (@lundinbridge) February 22, 2024
Williams isn’t entirely wrong. The standard used for greatness tends to be championships won. But comparing Clark to professionals is not entirely fair. You only get four years (max) to win in college. Tom Brady won his third Super Bowl in 2004 and didn’t win his fourth until 2014. Michael Jordan didn’t win his first NBA title until his seventh season. Even at the college level, if championships are where greatness is measured, was Mario Chalmers a better college player than Steph Curry?
Despite Williams’ gripe, the reaction to his comments on Clark was not simply people grabbing a three-second clip. Williams was given plenty of time to defend his opinions. And while he may not have been entirely off base, his points weren’t exactly clear hits, either.
[Photo Credit: ESPN]
