Charles Barkley has hit out at WNBA media personalities for their negative messaging surrounding superstar rookie Caitlin Clark.
“These ladies – and I’m a WNBA fan – they cannot have f**ed this Caitlin Clark thing up any worse if they tried,” Barkley said on The Bill Simmons Podcast this week. “People believe what we say on television. Just because people don’t like you or your personality, they can’t get on TV and slander you. It’s just total bulls***.
“If you got people in a room, a bunch of dudes in a room, we couldn’t have came up with a masterplan with what these women have done. This girl is incredible. The number of attention, eyeballs she’s brought to college and the pros, and for these women to have this petty jealousness. You’re saying to yourself, ‘Damn, what is going on here?’ And the thing I love about her, she never says a word. But these ladies, who I love and respect their game, they couldn’t have f—ed this thing up any worse. There’s been so much negativity.”
Plenty of WNBA legends have had no problem slamming Clark on TV and social media.
One WNBA legend who has been dubbed a ‘Clark hater’ is WNBA legend Sheryl Swoopes.
About a month ago, Swoopes claimed that Indiana could still qualify for the playoffs without Caitlin Clark, while Chicago would struggle without Angel Reese. Since then, Fever have made the playoffs first time since the 2016 regular season because of Caitlin, while the Sky are in eighth place out of 12 WNBA teams.
Then as recently as this week, she was feuding with Stephen A. Smith for not mentioning Clark when speaking about the Fever’s success.
“All I’m gonna say is, it was pretty damn immature to come back at me like that. Called me an f***ing coward?, Smith said on The Stephen A. Smith Show.”Because I called you out for not doing your job? … I mean the bottom line is this: she engages in a level of immaturity. Let’s just call it what it is.”
