Joy Taylor seems to think Angel Reese is doing Caitlin Clark a favor.
The Caitlin Clark-Angel Reese ‘rivalry’ is the gift that just keeps giving.
The discussion about which player is most popular and which benefits from the other more is pointless, given the fact that Clark is the sole reason anyone is paying close attention to the WNBA, but a select few keep beating the drum for Reese playing a key role in both the popularity of the league and Clark herself.
Joy Taylor is one of those people.
The FS1 host recently joined ‘The Joe Budden Podcast’ and hit not one but two stereotypical talking points while discussing Clark and Reese as she quickly brought race into the discussion.
“When Angel and Caitlin got into it in the (NCAA) championship game, and Angel did the ring thing, I said ‘this is the Magic Johnson-Larry Bird moment for the WNBA,'” Taylor said. “Like, this is great. I’m a storyteller. I think storylines are so fu-king important. I think you need villains, I think you need heroes. You need sh-t to sell. You’ve got to sell a fight. Like, brand, all of this. It upset white men to watch this strong, winning, unapologetic black woman be in Caitlin’s face, and they still cling to it.”
Taylor is right when she says that heroes and villains are important, especially when we’re talking about a league, the WNBA, that nobody paid attention to until Clark’s arrival, but Clark was already the face of women’s basketball when Reese taunted her during the national championship game in 2023.
Taylor went on with her take and made it clear that she’s not living in reality.
“And it’s now like spun to this whole thing where it’s like, Caitlin is better than Angel. I just said we would not be talking about Caitlin Clark the way that we do if it wasn’t for that moment with Angel Reese,” Taylor said, before repeating “I will die on this hill” over and over again.
Every single person in the room immediately shook their heads in disagreement, laughed at Taylor’s opinion, and rightfully so.
It’s baffling how Taylor and others have continued to cling to the idea that Reese has helped Clark gain popularity; the talking point is never the other way around. The fairest point to make is that both players have benefited from one another, just in a very lopsided way, but that doesn’t fit the hot take culture where you have to pick a side and stick with it, no matter how ridiculous it may be.
Taylor choosing to die on a hill ruled by Reese and not Clark is certainly a choice.
Clark hits logo threes every time she steps on the floor while averaging nearly 20 points per game. Reese grabs rebounds and occasionally scores in double figures.
