Dave Portnoy called for the firing of a USA Today columnist who compared WNBA star Caitlin Clark to the 1955 lynching of Emmett Till, arguing the writer belongs in an “insane asylum” for the piece.
Speaking on “Varney & Co.,” the Barstool Sports founder ripped into columnist Nancy Armour, declaring her comparison between Indiana Fever star Clark and the murder of Black teen Emmett Till the “craziest thing” he’s seen in more than two decades of sports media.
“We’ve got to put her in a straightjacket. You’ve got to find the nearest institution. You’ve gotta put this author away and throw away the key,” Portnoy said Friday.
“Firing isn’t really far enough. You gotta put her in an insane asylum. You gotta lock her up. And people who say, ‘Hey, Dave, that’s too far’—that’s nothing compared to what she just wrote,” he later added.
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Armour wrote that some of Clark’s supporters have interpreted her disputes with referees as a White woman who needs protection, then taken it out on other players on the court. Clark has been a frequent topic of discussion after facing physical play during games.
The author wrote that there is a “White nationalist element” to the dispute, and later added that, “it shouldn’t need reminding this country has an awful history of Black people being harmed, even killed, in the name of ‘defending’ white women.”
The writer then said the WNBA’s All-Star Game was being held in Chicago, where Emmett Till lived. Emmett Till was a 14-year-old Black boy who was abducted and lynched in Mississippi in 1955 after a White woman accused him of making advances toward her. The tragedy became a major catalyst for the modern civil rights movement.
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“I’ve been doing Barstool 24 years. I’m 49 years old. That’s the craziest thing I’ve ever seen in my life. The absolute craziest thing. To somehow equate the civil rights movement and Caitlin Clark arguing whether she got fouled or not,” Portnoy said. “It is pure insanity.”
Portnoy called for the firing of not only Armour, but also other members of the editorial staff involved with the article.
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“I do think she should be fired. I think the editor who allowed this to be published should be fired,” he said, later adding that not every story should be anchored around racial disputes.
“If you go looking for race under every single blank, every cover, you can make anything about race,” Portnoy said.
Armour apologized for making the connection in her article in a statement posted Thursday on social media: “In my recent column, I made an inartful comparison with the murder of Emmett Till. I intended to connect the issues the WNBA is currently facing with its All-Star Game being hosted in Till’s hometown of Chicago,” she said, adding, “I obviously did not provide enough context for that.”
Armour also noted that she stands by the assertion that perceived threats toward White women are weaponized against Black Americans but added that she sincerely regrets that her “lack of appropriate context is overshadowing that important conversation and the action that needs to be taken by the WNBA to address it directly — for the benefit of all players.”
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