Ex-NBA Player Royce White Brings Up Luka Doncic to Defend Caitlin Clark

Royce White was courtside in Indianapolis on Friday as the Indiana Fever beat the Connecticut Sun 111-91. Afterward the former NBA first-round pick posted a long monologue on X. The target was not the box score. It was the way some critics talk about Caitlin Clark.

White called Clark “incredible” and said the hate directed at her is embarrassing.

“Anybody who’s hating on her, you guys are, I mean, it’s embarrassing. I’m embarrassed for you,” he said in a video posted on X. He argued that the backlash is “admittedly based on race” and tied to claims of “her white privilege.

"What’s white privilege about this step back three ball in your grill? There ain’t no white privilege,” White added. “It’s more of a women’s game thing because nobody says Luka Doncic has white privilege. Nobody says Austin Reaves has white privilege. Nobody says some of the great white players who have played in the NBA had white privilege."

Clark has had to bear that take since Iowa and her Fever rookie surge. Some commentators have said race and marketability helped her become the face of the league.

Clark herself has said she earned what she's become. She also acknowledged privilege as a white person. White’s post rejected the idea that privilege, not production, explained the step-backs and the packed building he sat in.

White did not walk into Gainbridge Fieldhouse as a neutral analyst. He has spent the summer forcing himself into the WNBA eligibility fight.

He asserted that he identifies as a woman “for purposes of basketball.” Royce White and Enes Kanter Freedom both declared for the 2027 draft. The league indicated they are not eligible.

Showing up courtside in Indianapolis was another chapter of that campaign, not a one-off fan visit.

Days earlier Kanter was ejected and then banned from Chicago Sky home games after a courtside confrontation. White praised the Indiana environment against what happened in Chicago.

White was a first-round pick who barely played in the NBA. He later ran for office in Minnesota.

Royce White Says Nobody Calls Luka Doncic’s Success White Privilege the Way Critics Frame Caitlin Clark

Doncic is the example White chose because his résumé is hard to ignore. He is a superstar who changed a franchise, wins at a high volume, and still draws style-of-play debates that are about basketball.

White’s claim is that those debates do not get reduced to “white privilege” in the NBA the way Clark’s success does in the WNBA.

Austin Reaves is the second name for the same reason. A white guard whose rise is usually argued in terms of role, shot-making and fit, not identity first.