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Women’s basketball legend Cheryl Miller had strong words for Caitlin Clark’s critics.
Miller blasted them as “big dummies,” claiming they ridiculed Clark, who is white, for her race.
“I’m gonna be honest, because it needs to be said,” Miller said on the “All the Smoke” podcast. “I can relate to that young lady, and I felt for her. I know what it’s like to be hated. I know what it’s like to be a black woman and to be hated because of my color. I can’t imagine this young lady, I don’t want to use hate, but despised.
“She brought some on herself, a little bit, because she’s cocky for a good reason. And I love that about her. But to watch the dynamics, and the media, they had their narrative. And I was pleased and proud to see the narrative wasn’t the truth. And Angel [Reese] and her got along so well.”
Clark won the WNBA’s Rookie of the Year award last year, averaging 19.2 points and 8.4 rebounds per game in her first season with the Fever.
‘Is she getting hyped? Yes,” Miller said. “But she was in the backyard. She was putting in the same time, sometimes maybe more than you were. I can’t fault her for what she was given.”
She helped the league skyrocket in popularity and viewership but also received plenty of criticism from people who thought her fame benefited from white privilege.
That included Mystics co-owner Sheila Johnson, who said Clark’s race played a factor in her winning Time Magazine Athlete of the Year.
“It’s just the structure of the way media plays out race,” Johnson told CNN last year. “I feel really bad because I’ve seen so many players of color that are equally as talented and they never got the recognition that they should have, and I think right now, it is time for that to happen.
“You read TIME Magazine, where Caitlin Clark was named athlete of the year, why couldn’t they have put the whole WNBA on that cover and said, ‘The WNBA is the league of the year,’ because of all the talent that we have.
“When you just keep singling out one player, it creates hard feelings and now you’re starting to hear stories of racism within the WNBA, and I don’t want to hear that. We have got to operate and become stronger as a league and respect everyone that’s playing and respect their talents.”
Miller — the sister of NBA legend Reggie Miller and a longtime coach and broadcast analyst — starred at USC and led the Trojans to two national championships and is among the greatest women’s basketball players ever.
She was a three-time National Player of the Year award winner, averaging 23.6 points and 12.0 rebounds across her four seasons.
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