Caitlin Clark Fans Call ESPN Out for Stat Screw Up in WNBA Player Ranking
On July 14, ESPN released a ranking of its top 25 players in the WNBA before the All-Star Break. While subjective rankings articles like these are always going to catch some flak from fans, one particular misstep that ESPN made in releasing this piece is irking the fan base of one superstar.
Of course, given that Indiana Fever star guard Caitlin Clark is the WNBA's biggest name, fans were especially keen to see where she landed in terms of ESPN's rankings. And she was placed in the No. 9 spot, with writer Alexa Philippou writing of No. 22, "Clark is a difficult player to assess given her lack of availability due to injury -- she has appeared in 12 games, sitting out two stretches of five games.
"Though she is currently amid a shooting slump (13-for-41 from the field and 5-for-19 from 3 since returning from her latest injury), she has shined with her playmaking. She has 19 assists over her past two games, including the 17th 10-assist game of her career Sunday -- her first with no more than two turnovers," she added.
While Philippou's sentiment is fair enough, Clark fans have taken notice of the fact that the blurb says Caitlin has 19 assists in her past two games, when she actually has 22. And even if this article was written before Sunday's game (where Clark had 13 assists) and ESPN forgot to update it (which would have still been incorrect), Clark had a total of 15 assists in the two contests before the Fever's July 13 game.
In other words, this inaccurate assist total was a mistake — which is frustrating some fans.
"They also said CC has 19 assists in her last 2 games when it's 22, while on a minutes restriction..." one fan wrote in an X post (that has since been deleted), along with a graphic that showcases the statistical mistake.
Another fan added, "Hey @alexaphilippou" please get the stats right."
Hey @alexaphilippou please get the stats right. https://t.co/p2wHuJIgaP
— Ken Swift (@kenswift) July 14, 2025
While ESPN is within their rights to place players wherever they want in a subjective ranking, getting objective statistics wrong is not ideal.
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Grant Young covers Women’s Basketball, the New York Yankees, and the New York Mets for Sports Illustrated’s ‘On SI’ sites. He holds an MFA degree in creative writing from the University of San Francisco (USF), where he also graduated with a Bachelor’s Degree in Marketing and played on USF’s Division I baseball team for five years. However, he now prefers Angel Reese to Angels in the Outfield.
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