WNBA Controversies Explode Over Sophie Cunningham, and Angel Reese and Race, with Emily Jashinsky

I would never watch the WNBA. I just feel like they're so annoying. I don't know how Sophie Cunningham works in this league. I don't know how Caitlin Clarke does either. Dave Portnoy's saying that Caitlin Clarke should go start her own league, and she'd make gazillions of dollars, and she'd have a lot of people follow, probably Sophie. But there was a controversy on Monday, today it's Thursday, involving a ref. So there's a ref by the name of Sandy Brundello, and she is the coach of the Tempo. Coach, did I say, I called her a ref. No, she's a coach. She's the coach of the Tempo. And what happened was her team was playing the Atlanta Dream, and Angel Reese is on that team. And Angel Reese is a black woman in the NBA who's been on the wrong side of Caitlin Clarke a few times, and she's been very controversial, and she's quick to inject race into any controversy, and seems generally annoying, if I'm honest. But what happened in this particular instance is, I'm going to show you the play, but Reese, Angel Reese, secured an offensive rebound. She went to the basket against someone named Sabali. Reese put her shoulder into Sabali's chest to create space, but Sabali was called for the foul and collapsed to the ground in pain. A live mic then heard the coach, Sabali's coach, call Reese, quote, a protected species, while addressing the officiating crew. It wasn't like she said it under her breath. She said it to the officials who were reffing the game after Reese drew the foul. Here it is in shot seven. And she rolled over. Sandy Brundello pleads her case. Carl Smesko has walked over closer to the officials. Now, Brundello, the coach who said this, is an Aussie, and that phrase is apparently very common in Australia, in sports in particular. And it means over there that the athlete is getting protected or preferential treatment from the refs. That's what it means. So it was completely apt the way she used it. It did reflect what she was suggesting was happening. But a shitstorm rained down on her as though this had to be a racist comment. There's zero grace in the WNBA for anyone. Any small perceived slight will be blown up into a career endangering offense. So this woman, Brundello, ever since has been apologizing. She got suspended for a game. She was suspended from the game on Monday. She issued an apology to Reese saying, I used a phrase that I shouldn't have. I take full responsibility. I'm deeply sorry. I used it in the emotion of the moment. She didn't even just say, this is something that's common in Australia. It doesn't mean what you think it like. She just fell on the sword, fell. Now, did Angel Reese, given this opportunity to be magnanimous, to extend some grace to this coach, understanding that this is not what it was being painted to be at all. It's the Australian thing. And honestly, you understand what she's saying, but whatever. No, no, this is how Angel Reese handled it. Listen, I don't know what side it is, but my team's got it. Everyone, I'm sure everyone knows about the situation that happened last game. I'm going to address this one time. First, I appreciate Sandy's apology, but I also appreciate the love and support that I've had for the last 48 hours. It has been very overwhelming with a lot of love and also other things, but I am grateful that the league did take action on what the situation had happened. There is no place for discrimination or hate in this league from anyone, from fans to coaches to players. And I'm just grateful that we are able to move on from the situation and just play winning basketball. The WNBA is supposed to be positive and we are going in a great light right now. So I just want to continue that and move forward. Low Road, once again, tries to pretend that a racist incident has taken place and there's no place for hate in this league. She's got to lean into being the aggrieved victim of racism of this woman who did nothing wrong and paid a penalty for a completely innocuous comment. That the substance of which appears to be totally right, that Angel Reese does get protected. Whereas Caitlyn Clark certainly never does. Yeah, I mean, I have great news for Angel Reese. There was no discrimination or hate at all from the other coach who sounded actually like Caitlyn Clark's coach. When after that incident with the infamous incident where she basically got a punch to the throat, Caitlyn Clark's coach came out and condemned hatred and discrimination that had been directed against the opposing player instead of just like standing firm and saying the league is making my players less safe. You saw the clip you just played. It's not just Caitlyn Clark who's less safe because of this. It's the black players as well. And in the United States, we have a proud tradition in recent decades of celebrating our black athletes, our white athletes. It's actually incredible how we've been able to neutralize bigotry and discrimination, particularly in sports. And so for the WNBA to be mired in this racial controversy that's actually making people less safe because Angel Reese has put herself forward as a martyr for racial causes, that does make it tough for refs who know that every call is going to get clipped. They understand that every call now risks being clipped and put onto the internet and becoming a big racial controversy. And so, yes, they're probably less likely to call Angel Reese, to call fouls on Angel Reese when there are flagrant follows. That's making everybody less safe. It's not good for anybody. And as somebody who is the probably closest thing to a man on my high school basketball teams, not because I was particularly good, but because I was particularly angry, you know how dangerous women's basketball can get because there's elbows flying everywhere. You saw it looked like a kidney shot there, the throat shot to Caitlyn Clark. Somebody is going to get seriously hurt. We are lucky that it has not happened yet. Think about this. In 2006, $20,000 equaled roughly 33 ounces of gold at spot price. At today's prices, those 33 ounces would be worth about $165,000. That's why many smart Americans diversify a portion of their savings into precious metals. And that's why you should consider buying gold from Birch Gold Group. For thousands of years, gold has been a store of wealth. And today it's a crucial part of any balance strategy. Even better, Birch Gold can help you convert an existing IRA or 401k into a tax-sheltered retirement account in gold. 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I was like, now Caitlin got one, but why didn't she get one? Because if Caitlin's going to get one, then she should have got one. It shouldn't have been one or the other. And I was just kind of pointing and she's like, don't you don't you point at me? And I was like, oh, shouldn't have said that. And I didn't say a word. OK, that's so stupid. Like that is the stupidest thing I've ever done. It's probably the number one meme, at least on Twitter this morning, which is special. It was pissing her off. And like, I couldn't help myself. I could not. She was losing her ----. And all I was doing was literally pointing because it was you. I think it just plays better on the Internet. But I think what I agreed. And another thing is to why it played so well is because I literally did not say a word. So she's talking about how in that in that infamous exchange in which Caitlin took it to the neck that Caitlin got a foul. But the other girl who did it to her didn't get the foul until after the game was done. They came back and finally said, OK, that was a flagrant. But but that she's saying that she went and said, wait a minute, if Caitlin's going to get a foul, why aren't you going to get a foul? Why is Caitlin the only one getting a foul like this league? It's out of control. It is blatantly racist, just not in the way they say it is. Emily, they they really need a total reset because and I don't trust that they would be able to do a total reset in a good direction, because even as we've seen with the audience capture, like it's the coaches who then are coming out and groveling to the left, to the cultural left after these incidents happen. So even if they tried to do a total reset, it would probably go in the exact wrong direction. But what they really need is a reset to just restore some normalcy, some sanity to understand how amazing it is that this league even is able to exist and that the athletes black and white have so much support from people who, for whatever reason, just genuinely really love watching professional women's basketball and have some gratitude for the fact that they're able to play the sport at professional level with fans and able to get along on their teams. It's actually historically remarkable and they have no sense of perspective about it. They're just mired in these controversies, racial controversies that are genuinely making people less safe. And I think before any reset happens, someone sadly is going to get very, very hurt. They may be white, they may be black, but it's going to happen. You know, we're told in defense of this conduct, well, you know, you have to remember that the league is predominantly black and the players are also predominantly gay, like they're lesbians. So we have to like interpret all of their behavior through this lens and I guess, you know, cut them some slack. That's not the argument that they make when it's whites that are accused of being racist against a minority group. No one says, well, you have to understand that the majority in this group, they're white. So, you know, they don't like having this black person come in and get all the attention. I mean, imagine making that argument when it involves whites as the majority, but when it's blacks as the majority, as it is in this league, we're asked to just, we have to understand that it's a black majority league and therefore Caitlyn Clark and the attention she gets is very annoying to them. And so we just have to really cut them that slack, give them that grace because naturally they're offended that she gets so much attention. What do you mean? What are you saying? Did somebody give that lecture to the white golfers when Tiger Woods was the star of the world? That's racist. Like that's what's actually racist. That's not even just soft bigotry of low expectations. That's the hard bigotry of low expectations saying you have to cut slack to the black players for committing these flagrant, egregious fouls left and right because, you know, they are oppressed. They're an oppressed minority, which they're not even minority in the league. Like it's just ridiculous. It's the kind of stuff that again, falls apart when it's exposed to daylight with the majority of the public, which doesn't normally watch the WNBA, but the temperatures have risen in the league among all players. And that's why we're starting to see these games. I think spiral out of control because the refs don't know what to do about it. They're under immense pressure. They know they're going to get clipped. They know they can find themselves at the center of racial controversies. Some of the players want to be at the center of those controversies because there's an incentive among the audience captured fans. So it's a really, really, really dangerous situation. We really, really value your input and your support. You may not always agree, but we are always going to talk about it and respect. No BS, no agenda, no fear.