USA Today is doing damage control over a controversial column by Nancy Armour on Wednesday about Caitlin Clark that invoked murdered Emmett Till and linked some of Clark’s fan base to “white nationalists.”
After Armour’s column about the Indiana Fever star sparked a firestorm Thursday, Front Office Sports says it asked USA Today’s editors whether they stood by her article.
“Nancy is a columnist and her column is clearly labeled opinion,” USA Today spokes Lark-Marie Anton told FOS. “Please note that the column has been updated for clarity, and Nancy has addressed the matter. We will not be commenting further.”
Anton was referring to Armour’s post on Threads, defending her including the 14-year-old Till’s racially motivated murder in 1955 in Mississippi.
However, Armour later wrote claiming she regretted not providing “appropriate context” in her piece.
“In my recent column, I made an inartful comparison with the murder of Emmett Till,” Armour wrote. “I intended to connect the issues the WNBA is currently facing with its All-Star Game being hosted in Till’s hometown of Chicago. I obviously did not provide enough context for that.”
“However,” she added, “this point stands: There is a history in this country of perceived threats to white women being weaponized against African-Americans, and the danger that poses to Black players in the league. Players have been abused online and have reported receiving death threats. That has to be taken more seriously.”
Dave Portnoy of Barstool Sports wasn’t buying the mea culpa.
“Congrats to USA Today’s Nancy Armour – she has written the dumbest paragraph not only of my lifetime but in the history of sports” Portnoy tweeted. “This is an article that says Caitlin Clark arguing calls has become dangerous for the WNBA and civil rights. Nancy Armour should be put in a straight jacket and locked up. We can’t have these types of smooth brains roaming freely in society.”
The WNBA fined Alyssa Thomas $1,000 and suspended her for one game after she pressed her fist to Clark’s throat during a game last month, after which Thomas said that she received threats against her life.
Armour and USA Today have been taking a pounding since the column, with critics bashing it as over-the-top ragebait, reports Michael McCarthy of Front Office Sports.
McCarthy featured a response to the strange Armor column from Sam Vecenie, a senior hoops writer at The Athletic.
Vecenie wondered how the piece ever saw the light of day. “There is a section/paragraph in this story that is among the most insane choices to include I’ve ever read in any sports story from a serious publication,” Vecenie wrote on X. “Like, the kind of crazy where I genuinely have no idea how an editor let it get through.”
A tweet from Outkick’s Dan Zaksheske also is required reading according to McCarthy: “There have been a lot of horrible takes about Caitlin Clark, but USA Today’s Nancy Armour just posted the worst one,” Zaksheske wrote. “By a mile. Armour says Clark is putting ‘Black’ and ‘queer’ WNBA players ‘in danger’ by … flopping and arguing with refs. Seriously?”
“Sports ‘journalism’ is broken,” said Clay Travis, founder of Outkick. “Armor says she made an ‘inartful comparison’ between Caitlin Clark complaining about fouls and the murder of Emmett Till. Bigger issue here is sports writing is so woke @USATODAY published it.”
“This woman belongs in a mental hospital, not writing sports columns,” Travis added. “How the hell does @USATODAY publish this?”
USA Today updated Armour’s piece with an editor’s note Thursday stating: “This column has been updated to provide further context and clarity.”
Armour, who wrote for The Associated Press for two decades before joining USA Today twelve years ago, frequently writes about the intersection of sports and social issues,
*Google some of Nancy Armour’s pieces on trans athletes,” tweeted podcaster and ex-Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly. “We’ve been covering her for years & trust me: her woke insanity knows no bounds.”
