Longtime NBA analyst Ric Bucher wants to know why all of the WNBA broadcast hosts and analysts are women, saying it “feels like a girls’ club.”
“Women have served in a variety of positions on national NBA broadcasts,” Bucher said on his On The Ball podcast. “Why shouldn’t there be diversity on national WNBA broadcasts? What are the networks afraid of? The only males you will find on national broadcasts now are young up-and-comers doing play-by-play. Is the WNBA not worthy of being discussed and dissected by a variety of voices and perspectives in the same way the NBA is?”
While admitting that there are “some smart, basketball-savvy women” in the studio and broadcast booth, Ric Bucher says he doesn’t hear “a whole lot of differing opinion or debate.”
“It all comes off as safe and monotone and cookie-cutter, especially when it comes to controversial topics,” Bucher continued. “DiJonai [Carrington] took Sophie Cunningham’s head off, and the broadcasters were debating whether it would be elevated to a flagrant two. They sounded afraid to say it, even after multiple replays showed DiJonai made no attempt to make a play on the ball. The studio analysts were no better.”
“All of it feels like a girls’ club,” Bucher added. “The media is protecting the league from real scrutiny or critique. I’ll ask again, what are they afraid of?”
Perception isn’t always reality, but it still matters
Bucher also pointed out later in his monologue that the “only full-time NBA refs who also work [WNBA] games are women.”
“Why is that?” he asked. “Is the WNBA beneath the men who work NBA games? Would they be too authoritative?”
At another point he said the WNBA “is not treated with respect by those that are closest to it. Not by the NBA, which owns and shadow runs it. Not by the media that covers it. And, unfortunately, not always by the coaches and the players who compete in it.”
Is he right? Probably not in everything he said. Maybe not in most of what he said. But certainly some of what he said is true. Especially at least from a perception standpoint.