Caitlin Clark injury will not destroy women’s basketball — Kelly Graves talks Oregon basketball

Basketball Wednesday

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When the news came that Caitlin Clark would miss at least two weeks with a quad injury, I knew immediately that the response to such an announcement would easily outstrip the reality of it. Everything involving Caitlin Clark does, particularly the doomsaying that comes with any perceived setback.

The thing is, short of Clark coupling her otherworldly play with a Cal Ripken-level streak of health, this was always coming. Players get injured, miss time, return to play — this is part of being a professional athlete. And if your view is that the WNBA’s growth isn’t just supercharged by Clark, but entirely the result of Clark and Clark alone, I suppose the panic from Clark missing any time makes sense within that absurdly narrow worldview.

I will reiterate what I have been telling you for years: women’s basketball doesn’t need saving, and it isn’t about one person. And I don’t mean to assert my bona fides to make this claim, but this is coming from someone who wrote the book on Caitlin Clark!

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Here’s the thing: Caitlin Clark draws attention and eyeballs like no one else in the history of the sport. But the league was on a significant upward trajectory before Clark even arrived. The attendance, the ratings, you name it — all of it was moving in the right direction, just as the women’s NCAA Tournament grew before Clark, spiked with Clark, and reached heights this season, post-Clark, that exceed its pre-Clark levels. Caitlin Clark has maximized this attention like no one else. But the infrastructure necessary for Clark’s rise predates Clark and is strong enough to weather a few games of injury to her.

Cathy Engelbert and the WNBA have already signed a new media rights deal that increased revenue to the league by around a factor of eight when all the games are finally sold and accounted for. These networks didn’t just do that for Caitlin Clark games alone. Every network understands that Clark, like any other player, is a non-contact injury away from missing not just two weeks, but an entire year.

The New York Liberty sold equity this week at a valuation of $450 million. I did some digging, and it turns out that Caitlin Clark does not even play for the New York Liberty.

This is, potentially, four games. This is not even close to a full season, which, again, the WNBA is in a position to weather. The resale ticket market for several Indiana Fever games has tanked, which is, of course, what happens when LeBron James or Leo Messi are forced to miss time due to injuries, and there is no associated chorus worrying that the entire sport will be forced to shut down as a result. The resale ticket market isn’t even revenue which flows to the WNBA or its teams! Caitlin Clark has absolutely supercharged the financial growth of the league, resulting in signing lucrative long-term deals. And believe it or not: with Caitlin Clark out for 14 days? The WNBA doesn’t have to give that money back. It’s true!

I am old enough to remember when a vastly less-solid WNBA had to do without Diana Taurasi for its entire 2015 season, after Taurasi chose not to play in the league and instead rest for the summer — choosing instead not to play, being paid not to play by her Russian team. (Can you imagine the freakout if this had happened with Clark in 2025?!?) That was a very different time for the sport, and some people worried about the league in existential terms. Los Angeles nearly lost the Sparks, and other franchises folded or moved.

But the WNBA more than weathered that storm. It turned out Elena Delle Donne was ready to grow from intriguing to remarkable, Tamika Catchings had one more playoff run in her, and the combination of Maya Moore and Sylvia Fowles was pretty formidable! The league more than survived at a moment the media rights deal it held was worth a small fraction of what it is now and franchises were so expendable that shortly after getting foiled in his plan to whitewash Isiah Thomas’ reputation by making him the owner of a women’s basketball team, Jim Dolan left the Liberty by the side of the road. (How’s that financial decision working out for him?)

You want a crisis for women’s basketball? The WBL’s primary investor, George Nissen, beset by lawsuits over his signature creation, the trampoline, which forced him to pull out of his financial backing of the league. That’s a crisis! The First Lady of the United States, Lou Henry Hoover, leading a successful nationwide effort to end competitive sports for girls and women. That’s a crisis! Even Dolan’s actions, were it not for the purchase of the Liberty by Joe and Clara Wu Tsai, constituted a crisis of a lesser magnitude, the WNBA left without a true flagship franchise in New York City. (No, White Plains doesn’t count.)

These are crises! Caitlin Clark is out for a few games, the league is overstuffed with other absurdly watchable stars who will be featured on TV and in arenas filled with people brought to the WNBA by Clark and others, while Clark will probably return to the court before the milk I just bought goes bad. She will be missed by the Fever, and by those of us who are continually impressed by the level of play she brings and the professionalism she pairs it with every day.

And then, when she heals her quad, she’ll be back. The league will be there, waiting for her, when she’s ready. But the league will go on in the meantime, and plenty of people will be watching.

I did not, and will not, ask the WNBA for comment.

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Five at The IX: Kelly Graves, Oregon head coach

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