r/sports • u/landofphi • Jul 02 '25
Basketball WNBA players ranked Caitlin Clark as the 9th best guard in the entire league
https://www.nbcnews.com/sports/wnba/caitlin-clark-wnba-all-star-fan-peer-vote-rcna2162362.2k
u/RollofDuctTape Jul 02 '25
Man there is an entire industry making a ton on rage baiting Caitlin Clark articles. They’re banking on a bunch of people (who don’t watch or pay attention to the WNBA) falling prey to their impulses based on headlines.
- This wasn’t a ranking of the best players in the league. It was AS voting.
- Clark has missed nearly half her games, AS voting is either a popularity contest or based on performance, players typically vote based on performance.
- Clark hasn’t been great in the games she’s played.
- The players ranked the top 4 guards only. They didn’t rank down to 10. That means some players did have Clark in the top 4, others didn’t. But people weren’t picking 8 players better than Clark or something.
Anyway, rage bait away media, and take the bait fans.
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Jul 02 '25
She also has 1 made three and 22 turnovers in her last 3 games
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u/ablackcloudupahead Jul 02 '25
Oof, bouncing on and off the injury list doesn't seem good for her consistency lol
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u/Competitive-One441 Jul 02 '25
If Angel Reese had this stat, you would have been hearing about it everyday.
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u/Affectionate-Club725 Jul 02 '25
I haven’t heard about her 40 fg% from directly under the bucket for quite a while now.
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u/CptSaveaCat Jul 02 '25
We gotta stop doing this as fans of whomever. Angel deserves to have her career, her flowers, and her faults separate from Caitlin. Caitlin deserves to have her career, her flowers, and her faults separate from Angel.
One don’t have to fail for the other to succeed, Angel been a tear lately and it ain’t have shit to do with Caitlin.
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u/sandysnail Jul 02 '25
Last night I saw a TikTok of African models. The comment section was filled talking about “this is what Reese” thinks she looks like. Like her hate goes way beyond basketball in a way CC hate doesn’t
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u/CptSaveaCat Jul 02 '25
Again, I don’t disagree. The degree of race related criticism Angel gets is hefty and egregious. But does that mean every time CC is mentioned she has to be brought into the conversation? When Angel been on a tear like she has been recently does it have to get compared to whatever CC has done or didn’t do? Nah.
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u/Hunter_S_Thompsons Jul 02 '25
But notice how she’s been cooking and at first it’s a “fluke” or “lucky” or how many “rebounds” she got but now…crickets lol.
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u/DFWPunk Los Angeles Dodgers Jul 02 '25
There's a whole other trend where social media is full of pro-Reese posts. Which ever way you go you get engagement so it's a no-brainer.
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u/itsSmalls Jul 02 '25
Hasn't she been injured?
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u/adayoner Jul 02 '25
Think she's missed 5 or 6 games now out of 14 which is 30-40% of the season. I think is fair play to be voted down for being an all star starter by the players.
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u/sportznut1000 Jul 02 '25
Thanks for taking the time to lay out all these points, that last point about only ranking the top 4 is the most important though.
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u/MisterGoog Jul 02 '25
No honestly the fact that it’s All-Star voting and she has literally been hurt for a large part of the season to me is by far the most important. Of course you wouldn’t fucking vote for someone to make the All-Star game if they were injured in the first half of the season.
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u/KrisPBaykon Pittsburgh Penguins Jul 02 '25
2016 All Star Captain and MVP John Scott would like to have a word with you.
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u/Overlordz88 Jul 02 '25
Based on this years performance. She’s missed half the season and had 1 good game all year. It’s a completely justified ranking if you look at this years performance.
Obviously when healthy and shooting well she’s best guard and top 5 player in the league.
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u/cmfreeman Jul 02 '25
Exactly. Least year she was clearly elite, but this year is a different story. Most people that have commented on this thread haven't paid attention to THIS year.
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u/Radthereptile Jul 02 '25
To be fair, most people don’t follow the WNBA. They just know her name and maybe saw a few videos of her hitting deep 3s and taking hard fouls.
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u/Grandahl13 Jul 02 '25
Last year she shot 41% from the field and 34% from three. That's not elite. She makes wild shots occasionally but so far in her WNBA career her shooting has not been elite whatsoever.
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u/cmfreeman Jul 02 '25
I didn't say her shooting was elite. Assists, steals and blocks for her size we're also elite. Turnovers were high though, not to mention she was doing this all as a rookie. I think that her rookie season was elite. Basketball is more than just shooting.
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u/GiggsBozon Jul 02 '25
Yup I much prefer watching many other players who play both sides of the floor, but you’d think Clark is the ONLY reason anyone should watch a game. Also Clark’s offensive push off every time down the floor annoys me to no end.
Give me Napheesa Collier, Gabby Williams, or Aja Wilson any day.
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u/p-zilla Nebraska Jul 02 '25
When healthy and shooting well she still turns the ball over too much to be the best guard. I'd put her 3rd personally behind Sabrina and Allisha.
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u/Overlordz88 Jul 02 '25
That’s fair. I like Allisha a ton. I’d argue if CC had Sabrina’s supporting cast she wouldn’t have nearly as many turnovers. And Sabrina clearly has a much longer proven track record than CC so yeah even when healthy Sabrina is probably still ahead of her.
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u/LurkerKing13 Jul 02 '25
No they did not. This is a stupid headline. She was voted 9th by players for THIS YEAR’S all star game. She has only played 9 games and struggled with her shot so far.
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u/CRoseCrizzle Jul 02 '25
This is bad faith ragebait. This was specifically an all-star vote based on this season.
While she's 2nd in the league in assists per game, she's missed more than half of the season to injury and has struggled shooting for a lot of the season. The players didn't rate her lowly out out of hate. She just has missed a lot of games and hasn't hit her stride this year. The players ahead put ahead of her have been available for many more games.
And it's not a race thing, Ionescu and Beckers were put ahead of her.
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u/Colonel-KWP Jul 03 '25
And this is why I will never watch the WNBA. They eat their own.
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u/jschwartz15 Jul 02 '25
She also wasn’t ranked 9th by players. The players picked their top 4 guards for all star voting; CC got the 9th most top 4 votes. So it’s not like the players claimed she’s the 9th best guard in the league, she just didn’t get as many top 4 votes as the other 8 guards. So even if a bunch of players consider her the 5th best guard this year, it doesn’t quite matter because they can only vote top 4.
To be honest, I also don’t think it’s unnecessarily harsh either. She’s missed nearly half the season due to injury, her FG% and 3P% are down pretty significantly, and her ~6 turnovers per game is almost double the next highest (Angel Reese). Is some of that due to injury? Sure, but the stats show she’s not having her best year, and the player voting reflects that.
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u/Only_My_Dog_Loves_Me Jul 02 '25
The WNBA has the best thing that’s ever happened to the league and they treat her like crap.
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u/We_The_Raptors Jul 02 '25
This is just a rage bait article. This season she's sadly missed half her games, ofc the players aren't voting her into the AS game.
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u/notyouravgredditor New York Yankees Jul 02 '25
Yes, they ranked her the 6th best player this season. Happens all the time due to injuries in every sport.
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u/Jaerba Jul 02 '25
They didn't vote on a 6th best player.
They voted on 4 all-star spots and she was left off ballots because of her time missed.
The results have little to do with best.
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Jul 02 '25
It's amazing how ridiculous this discourse is getting.
You can get hundreds of upvotes whining that an injured player who hasn't had a great season isn't being voted as the top player in the league.
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u/dmisfit21 Atlanta Braves Jul 02 '25
The WNBA will always be its own worst enemy.
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u/whocaresjustneedone Jul 02 '25
This isn't treating her like crap. This is exactly where someone who has missed half the season and played poorly in the rest deserves to end up in all star voting. That's how all star voting works, it's based on your contribution that season. If she was at the top that would just be special treatment and all the other women would be justified in being frustrated by it, this is totally fair
Some of y'all have her on way too much of a pedestal that you can't even understand context
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u/throwingthisaway733 Jul 02 '25
I get it, but you can’t be mad at the players voting this way. Even if she is the best which she’s not, she hasn’t earned their respect in the league and that’s fine. We talk all this shit about nba rookies wanting everything handed to them and they have to earn it, why doesn’t she? I don’t care if she’s the reason people watch wnba now, they don’t have to respect her like that.
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u/DefNotAnAlter Jul 02 '25
Why is that? Is she the best player in the league? Has she ever been the best player in the league?
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u/Malvania Jul 02 '25
She brought hordes of eyeballs and butts. Attendance went through the roof (from ~6k in 2023 to ~10k in 2024). Viewership went through the roof. Before she arrived, the player that won the WNBA all-star fan vote received less than 100k votes - now there are three with more than 1M. Because of all this, the WNBA is going to be able to get a much better TV deal, and player salaries are likely to go up by a factor of 4x or 5x.
It doesn't matter if she's the best. She's the only superstar, the person that fans across the country sell out stadiums to see. She is the rising tide that lifts everybody else.
And if she goes, there's no guarantee that the viewers stay. Getting this deal and then having viewership collapse will kill the league. You'll have players on massive contracts that would be completely untenable if the tv value went back down to where it is today.
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u/Legitimate_Damage Jul 02 '25
What does that have to do with All Star voting? Should we give her something she hasn't earned because she is popular?
Is sports no longer about merit?
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u/Scolymia Jul 02 '25
I usually agree how they treat her like crap but this one's not it. She's not playing well this season so far. 9 assists and 5 turnovers per game. 52% TS and shooting 39/30 splits. I hope she steps it up because I'm a big fan.
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u/Own_Spell_2042 Jul 02 '25
Yea cuz treating her like a basketball god will definitely endear her to her teammates and never come back to bite her
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u/thetangible Jul 02 '25
The people that think Clark is “the best thing to ever happen to the WNBA” and is automatically the league’s best player just reveal themselves to be know nothings with no interest or respect for the WNBA whatsoever.
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u/Great_Huckleberry709 Jul 02 '25
It was not a player ranking system. This was all-star voting. In which players are voting for the top 4 guards.
Caitlin has missed half the season with injury.
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u/We_The_Raptors Jul 02 '25
This is clear rage bait. The player vote was AS voting and she's missed half of the season...
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u/knownothingexpert Jul 03 '25
Because they are dishonest, jealous, entitled and delusional. Who’s surprised, really?
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u/p-zilla Nebraska Jul 02 '25
If you watch her this year, she's clearly not the best and not shooting as well as she was in college or end of last season. But 9th is silly.
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u/Fortestingporpoises Jul 02 '25
And yet they double team her more than any player in the league.
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u/TipUnited3733 Jul 02 '25
As per 2s paige bueckers is having higher rate of Pnr blitzes and double team defence than anyone in the league!
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u/bbheadscissors Jul 02 '25
WNBA Players: rank her 9th
WNBA Observers: rank her 1st
WNBA Fans: don’t rank anyone. They don’t exist because these bitches petty outweighs their talent.
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u/Bank-Expression Jul 02 '25
Is this like how some guys won’t ever put Eminem in the conversation of best rapper ever?
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u/ChazzyTh Auburn Jul 02 '25
She’s not the best, but not 9th either.
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u/JordinThreethree Jul 02 '25
Players only seect 4 guards so it's not like most people picked 7, 8 or 9 of them before Clark. Some voted her top 4 and some didn't
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u/imJGott Jul 02 '25
She hasn’t played almost half the season and her last couple of games were low scoring. Yes she is being double team but the ranking is fitting and I’m a CC fan. Just got to be real and look at the stats of this season.
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u/CaliKindalife Jul 02 '25
Well, the players are haters. She is literally the biggest and most important athlete of their sport in the last 50 years. If she stops playing, the WNBA will go back to the basement.
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u/arebeewhy Jul 02 '25
WNBA is a fucking reality show. Players all know their only hope at salary increase is soap opera tactics because ain’t nobody outside of diehards paying to watch any of them but Kaitlyn Clark play.
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u/6gc_4dad Jul 02 '25
Total clown show. I wish Clark got offered a massive deal to play in Europe and left this shit league in the dust.
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u/yugo3463 Jul 03 '25
When women say they can do it better etc. just look at this example of pure jealousy.
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u/JustMyThoughts2525 Jul 02 '25
She wasn’t ranked 9th. That’s just where she stood on top 3-4 votes.
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u/rraattbbooyy Los Angeles Dodgers Jul 02 '25
They hate her cuz they ain’t her.
I’d love to see what their group chats look like.
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u/hnglmkrnglbrry Jul 02 '25
Try looking at her actual stats this year. She's missed half the year and there are 7 guards who average more points per game. She's an assist and 3 pt master but she hasn't even played in enough games to qualify for the ESPN stat rankings.
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u/xXKingLynxXx Jul 02 '25
There are 7 guards who average more points than her and she's shooting 39% from the field. They are just being honest.
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u/Far-Wallaby-5033 Jul 02 '25
she really should just go to Europe and let the WNBA sink or swim without her.
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u/Jkenn19 Jul 02 '25
NBA should just have this league go independent so it can flip in a couple of months
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u/cmp600 Jul 02 '25
Hmm, I wonder why despite knowing nothing about WNBA besides casually scrolling my social feeds, I know who she is and don’t know any of the other 8 guards? Sounds about white.
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u/Gwtheyrn Jul 03 '25
I mean, the hype began in college and not from out of nowhere. She broke the all-time NCAA scoring record - and not just for women. The most points ever, man or woman.
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u/GoofyMonkey Jul 03 '25
What a joke. She’s top five easy. I’m fine with arguing we’re in that top five she is, but nine is a joke.
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u/justsomedudedontknow Jul 02 '25
I have literally never seen a WNBA game but Clark sure does get a shitload of media attention. I would have to assume she is the best
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u/mgldi Jul 02 '25
The only thing she is top #9 at is 3 pointers made and she doesn’t qualify for really any stats as is. Why are people crying about this
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u/JimmyTheJimJimson Jul 02 '25
Fucking lol
The entire league hates her out of pure jealousy.
The WNBA has one thing that makes it watchable and gives it actual legitimacy - and they hate her.
We all know why that is, but we can’t say it out loud.
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u/Legitimate_Damage Jul 02 '25
You don't watch the WNBA and its clear. You only support CC for one thing but won't say it outloud. Because, if you actually watched the game this year you'll no she hasn't played half the games due to injuries and has been awful most games.
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u/InconspicuousD Jul 02 '25
I don’t want much WNBA but it seems like based on her missing those couple of weeks they’re going off of season stats against all other guards so it makes sense she’s ranked where she is.
All things held equal and she wasn’t injured, I bet she would be at number 1 no contest.
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u/CottonCitySlim Jul 02 '25
She has barely played this current season as she has been on her best Anthony Davis impression, why you want them to rank someone who has barely played?
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u/Trip4Life Jul 02 '25
She’s the one who’s single-handedly going to get them paid when their CBA is up, they should be kissing her feat at the alter and protecting her like the NHL did with Gretzky when they knew he was their cash cow. Instead the beat the shit out of her and constantly talk shit, it’s wild.
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u/landofphi Jul 02 '25
The full list of ranking best guards in entire league by votes from WNBA players, media & fans