Cameron Brink believes there is a “white youth” bias in the WNBA

WNBA

by Bridget Riley

Cameron Brink and this year’s star-studded rookie class are changing the WNBA and women’s basketball for the better, attracting new fans through TV ratings and game attendance.

But as the Los Angeles Sparks forward expressed In a new interview with Uproxxshe’s looking to expand that influence beyond numbers, hoping to play a role in breaking the league’s “younger white” privilege.

“I could go into more depth on this, but I would say just grow the fan base to support all types of players,” Brink said. “I will admit that there is a privilege for younger white players in the league. It’s not always true, but there is a privilege that we inherently have, which is the privilege of looking feminine. Some of my teammates are more masculine. Some of my teammates use they/them pronouns. I want to have more It’s accepting of that and not just having people support us because of the way we look.

“I know I can feed into that because I like to dress feminine, but that’s just me. I want everyone to be accepted, not just concerned about their appearance.”

The second overall pick in this year’s draft out of Stanford, Brink has continued to adapt to the league, not to mention the stressful narratives she and her fellow players have had to deal with.

“The most stressful narrative is that it’s vets versus rookies — the old-school versus new-school narrative — and the narrative that juniors need to be perfect,” Brink said. “I feel like… [Indiana Fever rookie] Caitlyn Clarke has it worse now, but even I understand it. She had three points last night [against New York on June 2]. I had three points last night [against Indiana on May 28]. We are expected to be perfect. We’ve been drafted to highly drafted teams after losing seasons, and that’s a good thing.

“It’s a learning process. But people expect us to be perfect, and it’s very stressful. I feel like we’re learning how to adjust, but it’s still unrealistic, and it kind of shows that people don’t know basketball.”

Rookie players are expected to experience growing pains, much of which has been well documented in Clark’s case, along with other on-field events.

Over the weekend, Clark’s hip was examined by Chicago Sky vet Chindi Carter, the error was later upgraded to a flagrant error 1.

Carter declined to answer questions about Clark after the game and said Monday she had no regrets.

Brink gave a strong performance to start her career.

The forward started all eight games, averaging 8.8 points, 5.4 rebounds, and 2.6 blocks on 47.2 percent shooting.

The Sparks enter Wednesday’s game against the Lynx in last place in the Western Conference with a 2-6 record.