Shaquille O’Neal says the way WNBA players have been treating Caitlin Clark is a rite of passage and something “all the greats went through.”
“Once she passes through that, the league will belong to her,” Shaq said during a CNBC Sport interview this week.
O’Neal claimed that he was subjected to similar treatment to how Caitlin Clark has been treated. He also claimed that he saw it happen to other basketball greats like Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant, LeBron James, and Magic Johnson.
“All the greats have to go through what we call rites of passage. She’s a fabulous player, but we’re not giving you anything, ever. You have to earn it,” O’Neal said. “So for her, she needs to toughen up, take those licks, and show them that, ‘These licks don’t bother me.’”
What he fails to take into account is that he and all those other greats weren’t almost single-handedly responsible for raising the entire salary structure of the league, boosting league attendance to all-time historic highs, securing perks players had been seeking for years like charter flights and expanded child care benefits, and bumping TV ratings to a never-before-seen level.
Shaq did admit, however, that there is a little more to the way WNBA players treat Caitlin Clark than just putting her through a “rite of passage.”
“There’s a lot of other girls with similar skills, who get no play, who get no mention, and there’s jealousy — professional jealousy,” he said, adding that if Caitlin Clark keeps setting records and doing things like scoring a career-high 45 points like she did on July 17, “Keep doing that, and the rites of passage will start to open up, and they will invite you in and give you the throne.”