While there has been significant debate around the WNBA leadership’s capitalization on Caitlin Clark‘s popularity, most fingers still point at WNBA Commissioner Cathy Engelbert. But according to Hall of Fame coach Muffet McGraw, fans are looking at the wrong person to solve their problems.
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Speaking on Good Game with Sarah Spain, the Notre Dame legend weighed in on the growing criticism surrounding Engelbert over how Clark is marketed. Instead of taking sides, McGraw questioned whether that responsibility is Engelbert’s to begin with.
“She has done a great job on the business side. I mean, the franchises are worth so much money now,” she began on the podcast. “I would actually like to see what her job description is because I get frustrated when I read somebody tweeting like, ‘I sprained my ankle, and Cathy didn’t send me a note.’ And I thought, is that her job too? I mean, I would love to know really what her job is. They’re not marketing Caitlin Clark. Is that her job? I don’t know.”
The comments came as Spain discussed the expanding expectations that have been placed on Engelbert, arguing that fans often blame the commissioner for everything, from player safety and marketing to league discipline and even personal communication with players.
McGraw suggested that the public often assumed that as the figurehead for the league, Engelbert controls every aspect of the league’s operations. That is likely not the case. Instead, McGraw focused more on the pressing issues beyond what Engelbert can and has done.
“I think a lot of things that happen in the teams, you know, the teams aren’t doing what they need to do. And I would be interested to see that because a lot of the communication could be better. Communication definitely could be better.”
Of course, this is all due to Clark’s unprecedented popularity. Since she entered the league in 2024, the ‘Caitlin Clark effect’ has caused massive spikes in viewership, public interest, TV ratings, ticket sales, and many other metrics. Clark’s debut All-Star Game in 2024 made the record for the highest-viewed WNBA All-Star Game of all time, with 3.44 million viewers per league sources.
Recently, however, Clark was left out of the league’s 30th anniversary poster. This led to backlash for the league and especially Cathy Engelbert. Even Clark’s teammate Sophie Cunningham thinks that Clark being omitted from the poster was Cathy Engelbert’s fault, posing a gap in the WNBA’s marketing of the Indiana Fever star.
“It is a joke, and this is why Cathy and the WNBA is getting lit up on social media because you’re leaving out a generational, the best player to ever go through the WNBA on this poster,” she said on an episode of her Show Me Something podcast.
Regardless of what the narrative around Engelbert is, McGraw’s perspective on her handling of various issues offers a reminder that before assigning blame, fans need to understand who is making the decisions in the first place.