How Caitlin Clark’s WNBA Spark Compares to Jordan’s ‘Be Like Mike’ Impact in the NBA

Start with the shoes.

Before Michael Jordan ever played in an official NBA game, his sneakers were the source of controversy and controversy. Jordan wore a pair of mostly black Nikes with a red swoosh during his first preseason games. The Chicago Bulls, concerned about the shoes’ glitter, had reservations about doing it again. The NBA also objected, threatening a $1,000 fine if he shook them a second time, and $5,000 for each time after that.

Exactly four decades later, Caitlin Clark’s sneakers also made headlines ahead of her first official game. Last spring, Clark agreed to a historic eight-figure sponsorship deal with Nike that is expected to result in her own signature shoe. There were no threats of fines this time around, but there was much discussion about what it meant for a rookie with no proven pro skills to sign such a lucrative and high-profile deal.

Clark has been compared to other basketball greats. Her shooting is reminiscent of Stephen Curry and Sabrina Ionescu. Her floor vision and precision passing remind fans of Sue Bird. Along with fellow rookie Angel Reese, the two immediate impact players have been compared to Magic Johnson and Larry Bird, whose college and professional games merged the two levels and helped boost the NBA in the 1980s.

Of course, Clark still has a long way to go before she has a resume that equals Jordan’s six NBA championships, six Finals MVPs, five NBA MVP awards and 10 scoring titles. She’s just entering her first playoff run as a rookie, leading the WNBA, but her impact on the WNBA is already comparable to His Airness’s impact on the NBA. Beyond flashing a nod to Jordan’s classic shrug after big plays, Clark’s impact echoes Jordan’s in other important ways: mass commercial appeal, national recognition and the ability to catapult a sport to new heights.

Michael Jordan and Steph Curry. Now Caitlin Clark. 🤷 photo.twitter.com/zKf0jNY3Ma

—DG (@DGHoopsz) April 1, 2023

“This is a culmination of a lot of factors over time,” said Bill Laimbeer, who played against Jordan during his 13-year NBA career and later coached in the WNBA for more than a decade. “(The NBA and WNBA) mirror each other in some ways, from the influx of talent, the rule changes to speed up the game, the brand recognition from TV and the competitive nature.”

Clark and Jordan first became college stars, leading their home-state universities to NCAA Tournament glory. More than 17 million people tuned in to CBS for the 1982 national championship game and saw freshman Jordan hit the go-ahead jumper with 17 seconds left to lead UNC to a national title. At the time, it was the second-most-watched telecast of the title game.

Clark, meanwhile, also created a ratings bonanza in women’s college basketball with her logo 3-pointers and clutch plays for Iowa. She headlined the most-watched women’s NCAA Tournament, with Iowa’s 2024 national championship appearance against South Carolina averaging 18.9 million viewers.

But the professional leagues Jordan and Clark competed in failed to garner the same proven audience loyalty they had managed to generate in college.

The rise of Jordan and Clark did not happen without strong foundations. There were pro stars before these two arrived: Bill Russell, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Wilt Chamberlain, Julius Erving, Bird, Johnson. In the WNBA, Rebecca Lobo, Cheryl Miller, Lisa Leslie, Tamika Catchings, Diana Taurasi, Candace Parker, A’ja Wilson and Breanna Stewart. There were developments in the actual gameplay of both leagues, which made for a more exciting product, and changes in the media environment.

In 1981, declining ratings meant that NBA Finals games were usually broadcast on time delay, and the Celtics and Lakers were the most televised games. Viewers eventually warmed to the league and a new wave of athletes, but it was Jordan who came in and electrified it with his showmanship as the Bulls dominated with peak ratings in the ’90s.

“Because Michael was in the league, we went from having one or two games a week on TV in the ’80s to almost every night there was a game,” said former Cavaliers player Craig Ehlo told Bleacher Report“I think the NBA’s marketing power for the rest of the teams was beneficial with Michael in the league. If he never plays, I don’t think they have the leverage to get the TV deals that they’ve gotten.”

Clark has similarly fueled an unprecedented WNBA fandom. The league has grown in popularity over the years. Still, six of the league’s television partners have set ratings records with Clark this year by airing Fever games, and the WNBA has had its most successful year in terms of ratings on ESPN platforms.

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How Caitlin Clark’s Rookie Season Has Been ‘The Perfect Fuel for a Fire’ for a New WNBA Era

Clark and Jordan have also lifted mediocre franchises. The Bulls had made the playoffs just twice in nine years before Jordan arrived. In the three seasons immediately before he came to town, they were in the bottom half of the NBA in total attendance before he led the Bulls on their dynastic run.

Clark has Indiana back in the playoffs for the first time since 2016, hoping to hold the Fever off the Connecticut Sun on Wednesday. With legions of fans following her, the Fever led the WNBA in home attendance after finishing in the bottom half of the league the last eight seasons.

Caitlin Clark’s WNBA playoff debut drew an average of 1.84 million viewers on Sunday, the league’s most-watched playoff game since the 2000 Finals. photo.twitter.com/w07FP07B96

— Front Office Sport (@FOS) September 24, 2024

“Clark had an immediate Jordan-like impact,” said Jack McCallum, a Naismith Hall of Fame inductee and former Sports Illustrated reporter who covered the NBA for more than three decades. “The NBA had Bird and Magic, and then the biggest star in the history of the game came along and threw his weight around. (Jordan) seemed to pull everybody along. A rising tide lifts all boats. I believe that’s going to happen with the WNBA.”

Salaries are perhaps the most crucial factor.

Jordan skipped his final season at North Carolina and signed a seven-year, $6.3 million contract with the Bulls. His rookie base salary was relatively modest at $455,000, slightly above the league average salary, but not by much. Clark also opted not to return to Iowa for one final season, signing for a modest rookie salary of $76,535. Like Jordan, she’s underappreciated (the average WNBA salary this season is about $110,000, according to HerHoopStats ) for what she means to the league.

Nevertheless, Jordan and Clark showed their true earning potential in the marketplace in their first seasons with groundbreaking sponsorship deals. Both are partners with Nike and Gatorade — Jordan was the sports drink brand’s first athlete sponsor in 1984. Perhaps an ad like “Like Clark” would be a fitting rehash of Jordan’s famous campaign.

Wilson has put together one-off basketballs and other small-scale product releases for NBA and WNBA players over the years, but only Jordan and Clark have worked with the brand to put together full multi-year collections, a company spokesperson said.

Clark seems likely to help engineer a WNBA salary increase, much as Jordan did for the NBA. In 1995, after Jordan’s first three-peat, the NBA salary cap jumped from just under $16 million to $23 million — the 44 percent increase marked the largest single year-over-year jump in league history. according to Spotrac. While WNBA players haven’t seen quite that spike yet, the league agreed to a groundbreaking television rights deal this season worth more than $2 billion over 11 years. Their ratings paradigm has shifted with Clark playing in six different network-record-breaking games this season, and the trickle-down effect will likely result in higher salaries when the next CBA is implemented, perhaps as early as the 2026 season.

Clark is still in the early stages of her career. She is six championships and 31,523 points behind Jordan. But there is another clear phenomenon.

“What Caitlin Clark has done for the game is generational,” said Nancy, a pioneer in women’s basketball. Lieberman said in a recent Fever broadcast. “As a baller to a baller, I just want to thank you, Caitlin Clark, for elevating our game. You and so many other great players for what you do. You’re going to make all these women multi-millionaires one day. Like Tiger did. Like Michael Jordan did.”

(Illustration: Meech Robinson / The Athletics; Photos of Caitlin Clark and Michael Jordan: Andrew D. Bernstein/NBAE via Getty Images,
Jeff Dean/Getty Images)