YouTube Gold: Caitlin Clark’s First Nike Ad

Basketball is secondary income now.

Over the last two years of Iowa Hawkeye hoops, Caitlin Clark has captured the public imagination in a way that few women basketball players ever have. She has a Stephen Curry-like game with endless range and immense smarts. And so it was no surprise that she was taken #1 in the recent WNBA Draft. Not surprisingly, the viewership for that was off the charts: the Caitlin Clark effect is real.

There was a controversy about her rookie salary. The WNBA, like many professional leagues, has a structure in place for rookies. For the WNBA, it’s particularly important since the league has never made a profit. It is subsidized by the NBA and would have gone under long ago if it were not. There is no way to pay similar wages to what NBA players make because the market has never supported it.

However, Clark’s WNBA salary is basically Christmas money to her because she has a big contract with Nike that will pay her millions. And here market forces will work in favor of both Clark and Nike because those shoes are going to sell like hotcakes. It's entirely possible that the Clark effect will help the WNBA’s bottom line as well.

Here is her first Nike commercial. There are going to be many, many more.