The WNBA Keeps Making Itself Irrelevant

Caitlin Clark just put together one of the best shooting performances of her career, and almost nobody noticed. That tells you everything you need to know about where the WNBA's priorities are right now.

Clark hit eight 3-pointers in a single game on Sunday, a league record that should have dominated basketball headlines for days. Instead, it barely registered. Why? Because the league is too busy stepping on its own rake over the issue of men playing in the league. And it seems determined to make things worse with every passing week.

Days before Clark's big night, the Toronto Tempo (which is a new team name I’ve just learned, by the way) unveiled a new mascot that was undoubtedly a deliberate jab at Indiana Fever star Sophie Cunningham, who has taken heat for standing up for women's sports. On Tuesday, ahead of hosting the Fever, the Tempo introduced Dez, a butch, non-binary Borealis Blue snapping turtle who uses she/they pronouns. The team describes Dez as a Taurus with "a fondness for soft shell tacos."

I’m not saying a word.

Anyway, Dez even comes with a sidekick, an anthropomorphic arctic hare named Dot who uses conventional she/her pronouns, because apparently that still needs clarifying in this league.

In case you were wondering, Dez is not the league’s first non-binary mascot. The Seattle Storm's mascot, Doppler, was actually the first one. In a league obsessed with sending a message, the only message they seem to be sending is that everything is more important than the players and the game itself.

Not only did the Fever beat the Tempo 101-95 in the same game where Dez made its debut, but Sophie Cunningham went off for 13 points on 3-of-4 shooting, including a perfect 3-for-3 from behind the arc, to go with two rebounds and two assists. Call it karma. Call it poetic justice. Either way, you can laugh.

Even Fox News couldn't ignore how badly the league is bungling this. "They're proving that women shouldn't have a league. It's too dramatic," Dana Perino said on The Five this week. "Why can't you just play?"

She made her case by pointing out how she barely knew the details of Clark's record-setting shooting night because it's not even being talked about.

"So nobody's talking about that accomplishment because we have to talk about the non-binary turtle," Perino said. She went further, arguing the WNBA's trouble isn't messaging. "The league has a problem in that, it's not a communications problem, it's a policy problem that starts at the top," Perino said. "And none of this is going to get better until they fix that." She added that the drama might be selling tickets in the short term, but "that's not good for the actual athletics."

“It’s not a communications problem. It’s a POLICY problem that starts at the top.” 🏀 @DanaPerino warns the WNBA’s constant controversies are driving fans away from the game. pic.twitter.com/X07SVTUjHm
— The Five (@TheFive) August 27, 2026

She's right.

A league that cares more about woke messaging than the talent and performance of its players has a problem entirely of its own making. These days, people aren’t tuning in to the WNBA because they give a hoot about the game or the players’ performance. They’re hunting for the next controversy. In other words, the attention the league is getting right now is for all the wrong reasons, and that just means the WNBA is becoming increasingly irrelevant.

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