David Dennis Jr. thinks some Caitlin Clark fans should stop sounding the alarm after the Indiana Fever got off to an 0-4 start in his rookie year in the WNBA.
During an appearance on ESPN’s “Around the Horn” on Tuesday, the senior writer for ESPN vertical Andscape said that rookies, especially those drafted at high positions, lose when they land on a struggling team. are likely to experience it, and expressed how that “baby” will manifest. The revered Fever Star is doing more harm than good to our current reality.
“The most detrimental thing to Caitlin Clark is that so many people coddle her and act like it’s a national nightmare for her to lose a match. This happens,” Dennis said of Clark. Ta. Clark lost 88-84 to the Connecticut Sun on Monday, dropping the Fever to their fourth straight game.
He then addressed the online criticism leveled at Clark’s Fever teammate, Aliyah Boston, as the losses piled up.
“For a team that has had the No. 1 pick two years in a row after four games, you can’t get the No. 1 pick unless you go to a weaker team. [4-0] He was a two-time New York Liberty,” Dennis said of Indiana, who drafted Boston No. 1 overall out of South Carolina last year.
“Obviously we’re expected to go 0-4. Their next opponent is the Seattle Storm (1-3). This team is not going to win many games. It’s not a standard. When we play against weak teams, we usually lose a lot of games.”
Clark, 22, arrived at Indiana with much fanfare after a stellar career at Iowa, where he became the NCAA’s all-time leading scorer and earned a second straight national championship appearance.
During Tuesday’s discussion, Dennis also mentioned another No. 1 overall pick, NBA Rookie of the Year Victor Wembaneyama. He led the Spurs to a 22-60 record in his first season in San Antonio.
“Victor Wembaneyama in the NBA just lost 17 straight games, but no one is talking about it being somehow bad for him. It’s part of the process,” he said.
Through four games, Clark averaged 17 points, 4 rebounds, and 5.5 assists per game.
With 36 games remaining on the schedule, it remains to be seen what the first season will be like for Clark and the Fever.
Fever hits the storm on Wednesday night.
