While much of the initial coverage around Caitlin Clark joining the WNBA centered on clashes with opponents, the call is coming from inside the house in recent weeks, leading even some of Clark\u2019s defenders in national media to reconsider their stance.<\/p>\n
That includes Shannon Sharpe, who on his\u00a0Nightcap live show over the weekend<\/a> took Clark to task for a viral confrontation with Indiana Fever head coach Stephanie White. In a video showing Clark and White in the huddle, Clark can be seen speaking sharply to White, who responds by subbing Clark out in favor of rookie backup Raven Johnson. Clark continues the disagreement as she walks away from the bench.<\/p>\n The Fever star then skipped out on postgame media commitments after the loss. The incident comes on the heels of several others relating to Clark, including a warning from the WNBA after the team withheld information about a back injury<\/a> as well as frequent chippyness with officials and opposing players.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve been in Caitlin Clark\u2019s corner. But enough is enough, now. I\u2019m tired of her behavior,\u201d Sharpe said.\u00a0 \u201cI\u2019m tired of the shoving, I\u2019m tired of the elitism, I\u2019m tired of the entitlement. Play basketball. She\u2019s not holding up her end.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n In response to Clark\u2019s heated interaction with White, NBC analyst Cheryl Miller called the star point guard\u2019s behavior \u201cdisruptive<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n Sharpe said Clark risks undermining her coach, whom Indiana brought in before last season after firing Christie Sides, who coached the team during Clark\u2019s rookie season.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat a lot of times I don\u2019t think people get when people say, \u2018I love passion\u2019 (is) if your coach can\u2019t coach you, you might as well just go ahead and get them up out of there,\u201d Sharpe said. \u201cIt won\u2019t be long, because if your best player keeps disrespecting you, (other players) are not going to respect you, either.\u201d<\/p>\n And even if Clark and White can figure out their relationship, Sharpe warned that Clark will begin wearing on her teammates and fans if she isn\u2019t already.<\/p>\n \u201cEvery night it\u2019s something. She\u2019s pushing somebody, she\u2019s subbing somebody, she\u2019s doing something,\u201d Sharpe said, before addressing Clark directly.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve given you the benefit of the doubt. And I understand you missed last year, and you tried to get your rhythm back. But enough, now. Come on now. You\u2019re too good of a player, but you can\u2019t just play one end of the court. And don\u2019t show your coach up. If you want to be passionate, be passionate on both ends of the court.\u201d<\/p>\n Recently, prominent commentators such as Cari Champion<\/a>, Colin Cowherd<\/a> and (an admittedly confused) Skip Bayless<\/a> have joined a growing chorus criticizing Clark for the distractions she has created. After a dazzling rookie season followed by injuries in 2025, Clark seems to be wearing thin with national analysts who stood behind her early on.<\/p>\n In his comments, Sharpe suggested the same could be true for the people around Clark in Indiana.<\/p>\n \u201c(Teammates) understand, you\u2019ve kind of been coddled since you got here,\u201d he said. \u201cEverybody has bent over kind of backward to appease you.\u201d<\/p>\n This season, Clark is averaging a career-high in points and has cut back on her turnovers. But the star\u2019s defense has been under a microscope more than ever, including in a blowout home loss to Portland that led to the disagreement with White and the latest round of chatter in the media.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"While much of the initial coverage around Caitlin Clark joining the WNBA centered on clashes with opponents, the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":708910,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[629],"tags":[49,735,48,2803,206824,7642,82,630],"class_list":["post-708909","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wnba","tag-ca","tag-caitlin-clark","tag-canada","tag-indiana-fever","tag-nightcap","tag-shannon-sharpe","tag-sports","tag-wnba"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/708909","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=708909"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/708909\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/708910"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=708909"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=708909"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=708909"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}