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You’re getting pushed around, Caitlin Clark. Those WNBA opponents are trying to rough you up and intimidate you, and it’s obvious. They want to prove all your college accolades and shoe contracts don’t make it automatic that you’re going to dominate them. They’re not rooting for you. They’re proud people, too.
They want to keep their jobs in the league and you’re a threat to that so they want to keep you down, put you in your place, show you you’re not as fabulous as so many people have been saying you are.
You’re experiencing what millions of people do once they graduate from college. Older people who have been in the working world for years aren’t very sympathetic to your situation. They felt the pain, insecurity, and aimlessness of being a newbie in the business world and they remember it and feel that anyone coming out of college has to pay their dues by being relegated to “just a rookie” status, a first-timer, someone who is green and unwise and has no idea how the real world works.
Welcome to adulthood.
You’re finding out in your first few games that this real world isn’t fun-loving college life. It’s serious. Opposing players are playing basketball to pay their bills. If you make them look bad, that may be enough for their coaches to decide they no longer want them on their team, and then they’ll be on the street looking for a job, striving to make money to pay for milk and eggs.
You’re not alone, Caitlin. I hope this is comforting to know. Everybody goes through this. When I was your age just out of college I took my first job and everybody told me how poor a job I was doing even though I was trying to do it well. No one told me in college that when you get into the real world people aren’t as kind and understanding. If they have a problem with your performance, they’re going to let you know, and if you don’t improve they won’t want to continue paying you and you’ll be looking for work somewhere else.
Being “on the street” is more real than you might imagine.
Still, I’m here to tell you that as rough a time as you’re having now it’s not always going to be this way. You’ll figure out some things. You’ll start to understand that in business situations people are primarily concerned about money and if you don’t threaten their money you’re going to steer clear of their wrath.
You’ll learn as these games continue throughout the summer that the pressure on you to perform better won’t relent and your opponents will keep being aggressive in defending you and they won’t compliment you much if ever. It may seem harsh and that’s because it is. Don’t expect this hard treatment to ever change.
This is how adults play the game of life.
But you will start to accept that this is how the real world works and will adjust how you act and prepare to compete in this intense environment. You’ll figure out that competing is at the heart of what all of us do and all you have to do is continue to compete as you have a high level your whole life.
The intensity, though, is now ratcheted up and won’t stop.
You can be certain now and going forward you’ll need to practice more than ever because now the other players are better than the ones you dominated in college. They’re practicing harder every day just like you are and will continue to. The question for you is how bad do you want to be great?
Your father says you’ve communicated to him you want to be the greatest women’s basketball player ever. Based on your performance in the first three games, it’s obvious you’ve got a lot of work to do to reach that mountaintop.
If you want this, you will have to sacrifice more than you already have in your life and practice more for years and years. There will be many times in the coming years when you may want to hang out with your friends but you will know you really need to go to the gym and take 500 or 1,000 shots. The choice you make will influence whether you become the best basketball player.
If being the best is what you want more than all the other fun things you could do with your life, you will have to put that other stuff aside more than you ever have. The great ones all find this out. They pay for it. Their family relationships often suffer. Being all-consumed with being the best comes with a heavy price tag.
Of course, there is another path. You could make up your mind right now that you don’t need to be the best ever and will be content being a mediocre WNBA player and socking away all your endorsement money. But your situation is unique – being a big celebrity – and this will also come with a heavy price. People will criticize you for not being as great as a pro as you were in college and those who have said you would go through a big adjustment in the pros will have been proven right.
The pressures to be better, to attain the zenith you did in college, won’t go away. Expectations for you are agonizingly high because of how high you’ve already ascended. Many are obviously not rooting for you to reach the top again. They’re all about preventing that from happening. What are you going to do?
No matter what you do, if you do become the best people will snipe at you saying you’re not as great as you were in college or overrated. If you don’t get to the top, they’ll say “See, we told you so.”
It’s a lot you’re dealing with, Caitlin. Not to mention all the sold-out stadiums and little girls hoping to grow up to be just like you.
I notice so far you’ve handled all this with class. Not once have you verbally jabbed with any of the countless people taking shots at you. I hope you keep behaving the way you are because eventually, hopefully, they’ll stop.
But maybe not. And this you will have to live with.
How you handle your fame will be a lesson for all those little girls to see. They want Caitlin Clark to be great and they want to be like you, and if you act in a way that is admirable without vitriol expressed for any of those spewing vitriol your way, those kids, and me, and many others are going to say one day: “That Caitlin Clark, she never lowered herself to take on all her critics. She stayed above it all, did her best, and showed us all what being a class act is all about.”
I’m rooting for you, Caitlin. Stay strong.
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Sammy Sportface, a sports blogger, galvanizes, inspires, and amuses The Baby Boomer Brotherhood. And you can learn about his vision and join this group's Facebook page here:
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