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ESPN “Around The Horn” star Bob Ryan wants you get off his lawn!
He’s shaking his fist at the sun! He’s tired of you stinkin’ kids and your loud music!
But perhaps worst of all, he doesn’t see anything special in women’s college basketball stars Caitlin Clark and Angel Reese.
I applaud the greatness of Caitlin Clark, Paige Bueckers, Angel Reese and Ju Ju Watkins, etc., but in fairness to their predecessors, I don’t see a better point guard than Dawn Staley or a better post player than Lisa Leslie. Great women’s basketball skill is not new.
— Bob Ryan (@GlobeBobRyan) April 2, 2024
Ryan went viral on Monday night for all the wrong reasons over a perceived slight to Clark, Reese, Paige Bueckers and JuJu Watkins.
“I applaud the greatness of Caitlin Clark, Paige Bueckers, Angel Reese and Ju Ju Watkins, etc., but in fairness to their predecessors, I don’t see a better point guard than Dawn Staley or a better post player than Lisa Leslie. Great women’s basketball skill is not new,” he said in a tweet.
Now, before we bash Ryan too hard. It appears that the point he may have been trying to make is that women’s basketball has been at a high level for several years now.
But instead, it came across as a slight to Clark, Reese, Bueckers and Watkins, all of whom stole the show in Monday night’s Elite Eight.
Basketball Fans Think Bob Ryan’s Tweet Is A Sign Women’s Hoops Have Arrived
Ironically, fans saw Ryan’s angry old man tweet as a sign that women’s basketball has finally arrived on the big stage.
“We getting ‘back in my day, it was just good as good or better’ tweets about women’s hoops, special stuff. This how you know it’s arriving on a mainstream level. Real equity and inclusion,” one fan tweeted.
“Cherry on top of tonight. You haven’t fully arrived until you get told you stink compared to the players of yesteryear,” said another.
Now, no offense to Staley and Leslie. Both are legends in their own right.
But it doesn’t take a basketball savant to see the game has evolved over the last two decades. So has the men’s game!
Clark, Reese, Watkins and Bueckers are the new generation. They’re immensely skilled and can do things previous generation’s stars never even thought of doing.
If Ryan wants to poopoo that notion, well then he’s free to die on that hill.