Elle Duncan calls on Caitlin Clark to denounce fans co-opting her name for nefarious motives

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After several years as one of ESPN’s most visible personalities, hosting the 6 p.m.  SportsCenter and anchoring WNBA Finals coverage, Elle Duncan departed the Worldwide Leader to become the face of Netflix’s growing sports venture . She’s also been tabbed to lead USA Network’s studio coverage for its WNBA broadcasts.

On Monday, Duncan appeared on The Sports Gossip Show podcast and discussed the ever-prevalent and increasingly bizarre coverage surrounding Indiana Fever star Caitlin Clark. Over the 2026 WNBA All-Star Weekend, Clark sat down with ESPN’s Malika Andrews and discussed how “emotionally exhausting” the constant coverage surrounding her can be.

“I feel like media and journalism have a responsibility to tell the stories,” Clark told Andrews, “and a lot of the time you guys are the ones controlling the narratives about what people read and what people talk about. And a lot of that is sometimes so far out of touch with what is reality.”

Although Duncan doesn’t believe Clark is at fault for how far out of control things have spun, she wants to see the three-time All-Star take more ownership of the situation.

“I would love for it to be very clear to the people who think they are her fans but are using her, if she would say, ‘stop that sh*t, I don’t want it, I’m tired of it.’ As opposed to what we’ve seen, which is ‘the media makes up these narratives, the media makes up this discourse.’

“That’s not true. The media highlights the stories, and they show it, but at the same time, like, the media did not make up that members of Congress are trying to get literal government intervention into whether you get fouled too hard. Like, this stuff has to stop.”

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Duncan acknowledged that as great a player and leader as Clark is, and as great as it would be for her to be able to keep her focus squarely on basketball, “the players against her would love to be able to not wonder if they hard foul her, whether they’re going to be called names or have death threats against them.”

“So let’s try to figure out how we can get you to that reality where you get to just focus on this,” she added.

Clark, who is unquestionably a phenomenal basketball player, has addressed and denounced the hate being spread online multiple times, but Duncan is correct that to this point, it hasn’t stopped outside agitators from co-opting her name, image, and likeness for their own agendas.

As the situation continues to escalate, Duncan knows there are no easy solutions to centering the conversation on the product on the floor, but is equally aware that something has to be done.

“I don’t know how that happens, but it needs to.”

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