Caitlin Clark’s coverage across the sports media landscape seems to be at an all-time high as of late, whether it be about her snub from Team USA for the upcoming Summer Olympics or how she is treated by her fellow WNBA players. And ESPN’s Monica McNutt seems to believe that one recent narrative around Clark has gotten too much coverage.
McNutt has been highly discussed as of late following her now-viral disagreement with Stephen A. Smith on First Take regarding Chennedy Carter’s pushing her to the ground in a game earlier this month.
The First Take segment quickly got off the rails when McNutt challenged Stephen A. Smith’s coverage of the WNBA before Clark came into the league. But the root of the segment was spurred from the discourse between McNutt and Smith about the foul.
McNutt has since spoken about the segment publically, calling it a “miscalculation” on her part because she thought that her relationship with Smith had “more depth” to where she thought she could openly ask that kind of question.
On Monday night, McNutt further expanded on the interaction with Smith on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, where she detailed how she disagreed with the topic leading First Take in the first place.
“The conversation Jon, it started about this foul over the weekend,” said McNutt. “Chennedy Carter for the Chicago Sky fouled Caitlin Clark of the Indiana Fever. And I’m not gonna lie to you Jon, if I take you through my day that morning. I get the call, or the text rather. And I’m like, ‘Are we really leading sports with this?’. Are we really leading sports with a foul? In sports? Alright, fine, let’s just do it.
“So we have the conversation with colleagues and friends, Stephen A. Smith and Shannon Sharpe. My larger point in the conversation was the tenor and the prevailing narrative that has been created about this season’s WNBA play is that it’s the league versus Caitlin Clark. And that is just absolutely false. It’s unfair to the women that have been there building the league to this moment so that Caitlin Clark’s popularity can take it to the next level. So by the end of the show, my tone had changed and I kind of needed to put my foot down a little bit.”
McNutt went on to further share her thoughts that the WNBA had women who were “worthy of coverage” before Caitlin Clark entered the league.
She does have a very good point here. It was a bit over the top to cover this foul on Clark as if it were the most noteworthy thing in all of sports, as its spot as the first topic discussed on First Take suggests.
The topic completely overshadowed what should have been the real story, which was Clark and the Indiana Fever winning the game over Angel Reese and the Chicago Sky.
Regardless, McNutt wasn’t all that happy discussing the topic, and the overall “WNBA versus Caitlin Clark” narrative as a whole. And on the surface, it’s hard to blame her.
