Have you guys noticed it, too?
It’s hard to define, but let’s call it the “Bubba/Smollett Paradox” and it goes something like this: Despite fervent outcries from the left that “racism” is as rampant as it is systemic, every high-profile incident of said “racism” almost invariably ends up, best-case, much ado about nothing, or worst-case, an actual hoax.
Weird.
Anyway, it’ll be interesting to see whether that paradox holds true after what happened Saturday.
In a sane world, all there would be to report about a WNBA game was that Caitlin Clark and the Indiana Fever humiliated Angel Reese and the Chicago Sky in a 93-58 rout that somehow wasn’t even as close as that score would suggest.
Clark — the reigning WNBA rookie of the year — put up a triple-double (20 points, 10 rebounds, 10 assists), while Reese almost shot the game date (she went 5/14 from the field, en route to another empty calorie double-double).
Oh, and there was a hard foul in the game.
In a sequence of events late in the game, Reese shoved Fever forward Aliyah Boston out of the way for a rebound.
It was a clear foul, and Clark, who was in the vicinity, stopped playing because she couldn’t believe a foul wasn’t called. When she noticed it was still a live ball and that Reese was going for the hoop, she fouled the Sky star.
Caitlin Clark received a flagrant foul on this play.
Aliyah Boston and Angel Reese received offsetting technical fouls. pic.twitter.com/jzQYEW92TW
— ESPN (@espn) May 17, 2025
(For most basketball fans, it was a hard playoff foul. The referees eventually upgraded it to a flagrant foul, but the softness pervading sports is a separate rant for a separate piece.)
An incensed Reese had to seemingly be held back by teammates as she tried to tell off Clark for the stiff foul. For Clark, it was a bit of an insult to injurious final score as she easily got the win against her rival in the first tilt of their sophomore seasons.
But Clark was also just doing her job, trying to prevent Reese from scoring. Any player of any skin color would have — should have — done the same thing.
Still, it was likely also a bit of payback for some of the shenanigans the Sky pulled on her as a rookie.
In other words, heated rivals don’t like each other — more news at 11. But seriously, that should’ve been the end of it.
But no. Surely you already see where this is going.
As noted on the Monday morning news/outrage cycle on ESPN, the WNBA felt compelled to put out some vague statement alleging racism seemingly against the Fever crowd — as if Reese needed any more of that sort of self-victim ammunition:
The following has been released by the WNBA. pic.twitter.com/LgSImP1x3Y
— WNBA Communications (@WNBAComms) May 18, 2025
“The WNBA strongly condemns racism, hate, and discrimination in all forms — they have no place in our league or in society. We are aware of the allegations and are looking into the matter.”
It’s unclear whether the statement refers to something that happened on the court or in the stands, and the WNBA has not elaborated since the statement was released.
While Indiana was never named specifically, there was only one weekend game that had any racial overtones.
ESPN, which has never heard a dog whistle that doesn’t make it salivate, pounced on this story on multiple levels, tying it to the Clark-Reese rivalry.
(And yes, other networks are just as guilty of this nonsense.)
.@McNuttMonica and @chiney share a message after Caitlin Clark’s flagrant foul on Angel Reese in Sky-Fever. pic.twitter.com/ND4sLCexEF
— Get Up (@GetUpESPN) May 19, 2025
ESPN’s Monica McNutt and Chiney Ogwumike took time on “Get Up” to give these completely baseless accusations oxygen, because of course they did.
But none of the network made this a bigger race issue that the ESPN analyst and ex-Pittsburgh Steeler safety Ryan Clark, who took to his podcast to say that anyone not married to a black woman (in this case, independent sports content creator and former NFL star Robert Griffin III, who claimed that Reese “hates” Clark) can’t have a valid opinion on this dispute because of … race, or something.
RGIII saying he could recognize “hate when ‘he’ see(s) it”, when referring to Angel Reese’s feelings toward Caitlin Clark was irresponsible, but not at all surprising. Clark’s the biggest star in women’s basketball, & deservedly so. No need to beat up Reese to add shine to it.… pic.twitter.com/u2IDFwctf0
— Ryan Clark (@Realrclark25) May 19, 2025
It’s all insanely offensive stuff (RGIII is married to a white woman and therefore has biracial children), but it’s even more infuriating because we have no clue what the WNBA is talking about.
It’s actually a massive dereliction of duty for the league not to specifically cite what happened, because otherwise, conjecture and gossip will run wild and that’s not fair to Clark, her fans, the Fever crowd — or the WNBA, which is being widely mocked for conjuring this “racism” out of thin air.
Look, is there a non-zero chance that some dumb, drunk fan yelled a slur or something? Of course, there is. But there’s also a non-zero chance of you winning back-to-back lotteries.
Until some receipts are provided, these race hustlers masquerading as sports outlets are diving headfirst into exacerbating race tensions based on nothing. Zilch. Nada.
It’s embarrassing that this story has become what it is in 2025.
It’s also not a surprise that ESPN is still desperately grasping for relevancy like this in an age where more people are becoming aware of the “Bubba/Smollett Paradox,” because that appears to be the only arrow they have in their quiver.
And that’s a darn shame for the once-venerable network.
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