INDIANAPOLIS — Caitlin Clark is trying ahead to taking a break from the highlight for a pair months.
The Indiana Fever star has been in the general public eye for almost a full yr, going from her senior season at Iowa to her rookie yr in Indiana in a matter of months. She hasn't had a break from high-level basketball (or from folks analyzing her each transfer) for 11 months.
She's taken pictures with followers on the grocery retailer, been noticed on trip in Mexico, gotten photos taken of her in the airport, and has followers ready to see her automobile drive out of Gainbridge Fieldhouse following video games. On high of that, she talked to the media at each probability doable — typically a number of occasions a day.
Caitlin Clark prepared for break: ‘Like everyone's watching your each transfer'
It might be an exhausting life, at all times having to be on; she's at all times getting requested to take photos or signal autographs, even when it is after a troublesome loss or occasions the place she's not feeling properly. It's arduous to stability that, too, as a result of that one image might make a bit child's yr.
It's arduous, but it surely's additionally one thing the Fever star is grateful for.
“I try to give people time if I have it, and it can be hard, because there are moments where you don't always want to pose for a picture,” Clark mentioned. “You just want to go and get your sandwich and eat your lunch. But I feel very thankful. I wouldn't change anything for the world. I feel very thankful for the relationships I've built, the opportunities that I've had, the way people have supported me, and whether it was at Iowa or whether it's now in the WNBA.”
So, after a whirlwind of a yr in which she helped to promote out dwelling and away arenas, broke the league's single-season assists document and rookie scoring document, and got here fourth in MVP voting in her first season in the league, Clark won't be enjoying any offseason basketball.
“She has endured a lot this season, and has handled it in the most professional way,” coach Christie Sides mentioned. “She's grown not just as a basketball player, but as a as a young professional.”
It's common for WNBA gamers to play some form of basketball in the league's six-month offseason; they go abroad to play in leagues in Turkey, China, Italy, Spain or different European international locations, or keep stateside and take part in player-led leagues like Athletes Unlimited or Unrivaled.
Indiana Fever contracts: Indiana Fever free agent salaries and participant contracts
For a very long time, gamers went abroad to assist complement their salaries. While WNBA salaries have risen in current years, it has lengthy not been sufficient for gamers to help themselves, particularly with agent charges, extra coaching, and optimum vitamin. So, even high-level gamers like Diana Taurasi, Breanna Stewart, Alyssa Thomas, and Sue Bird went abroad — the place salaries are typically a lot larger — to complement their lives. In 2015, Taurasi made $1.5 million from UMMC Ekaterinburg in Russia.
Unrivaled, beginning this offseason, is an eight-week 3×3 league in Miami, starting in January. Stewart and Napheesa Collier began the league as a manner for high gamers in the WNBA to make more money with out having to go abroad, and it touts the very best salaries in ladies's sports activities and an possession stake in the league.
But with the endorsement offers Clark has, she would not want the additional cash — even when it is thousands and thousands of {dollars} to play some basketball for a pair months.
On high of her $76,000 wage from the WNBA, Clark has an eight-year, $28 million cope with Nike, which supplies her $3.5 million a yr from the shoe firm alone. She additionally has offers with insurance coverage company State Farm, in which she seems in nationwide commercials, HyVee, Gatorade, Wilson, Gainbridge, Xfinity and Buick. While the particular numbers of these offers are unknown, she probably brings in thousands and thousands from these offers, as properly.
So, Clark will likely be taking some much-needed break day, spending time coaching in Indianapolis, visiting household in Iowa and happening trip. She's already made some appearances in Indianapolis, attending an open follow for Butler males's basketball (the place her boyfriend, Connor McCaffery, is an assistant coach), and going to the Colts-Steelers sport at Lucas Oil Stadium.
“It's gonna be nice, I think,” Clark mentioned, “Getting out of the spotlight and just getting to live my life and do things that I want to do.”
More: What's subsequent for Caitlin Clark? ‘I'm simply scratching the floor,' but additionally some golf.
Clark will nonetheless make some appearances all through the offseason, too. She and the Iowa ladies's basketball staff are scheduled to be honored for his or her run to the nationwide championship sport on the Hawkeyes' Oct. 26 soccer sport in Iowa City. As a part of her Gainbridge sponsorship, Clark will likely be a panelist for the Women's Leadership Summit subsequent month in Belleair, Florida, in addition to take part in the LPGA Pro-Am with fellow Gainbridge ambassador Annika Sorenstam.
With a number of different sponsorship alternatives, Clark will probably be busy all through the seven-month offseason — even with out enjoying organized basketball.
