Photo: Christopher Polk/Penske Media via Getty Images
On Wednesday night, ESPN held its annual ESPY Awards ceremony in Los Angeles. Instead of choosing a big-personality athlete to host the evening (Ilona Maher, hello?), the ESPYs tapped comedian Shane Gillis, perhaps best known for getting axed from SNL in 2019 after footage surfaced of him making racist, homophobic, and misogynistic jokes. While no one was spared by Gillis’s barbs (Donald Trump and Jeffrey Epstein included), he cracked an alarming number of distasteful jokes about the WNBA.
During his opening monologue, Gillis nodded to the Indiana Fever’s Caitlin Clark, who couldn’t make the ceremony owing to her travel schedule with the team. After noting he and Clark had both “nailed a bunch of threes,” he said, “When Caitlin Clark retires from the WNBA, she’s going to work at a Waffle House so she can continue doing what she loves most: fistfighting Black women.”
Gillis was presumably attempting to reference Clark’s perceived rivalry with Angel Reese — a dynamic both women have made repeated efforts to shoot down. For her part, Clark has also made a point of crediting Black women in the league as the WNBA faces an uptick in vitriol toward its Black players. At a 2024 press conference, she said, “Nobody in our league should be facing any sort of racism — hurtful, disrespectful, hateful comments and threats.” I guess Gillis feels differently.
Elsewhere, Gillis managed to bungle the pronunciation of Diana Taurasi’s name, calling the six-time Olympic gold medalist and three-time WNBA champion “Deanna.” He also pretended to point out “four-time WNBA All-Star Brittany Hicks” in the audience, before adding, “I’m just joking around. That’s my friend’s wife. I knew none of you knew WNBA players.”
Shane Gillis tricked the ESPYS crowd into believing his friend’s wife was a WNBA star 😭
“4x WNBA All-Star Brittany Hicks is here. Give it up for Brittany, everybody. I’m just joking around; that’s my friend’s wife, I knew none of you knew WNBA players.” pic.twitter.com/uC5Ta7v7u1
— FearBuck (@FearedBuck) July 17, 2025
Throughout the evening, Gillis mentioned repeatedly that he didn’t write all the jokes, but he sure seemed to enjoy delivering them. Toward the end of his monologue, he made it clear he was aware of how his brand of humor was coming off. “I see a lot of you don’t like me, and that’s okay,” he said, smiling. “That went about exactly how we all thought it was going to go. I don’t know why this happened.” At least we can all agree on that.
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