Even the casual sports fan knows Indiana Fever rookie Caitlin Clark is a generational talent, a boon for the WNBA and a transcendent star who has already taken women's basketball to new heights before even playing one game professionally.
But does she begin her W career as the best player in the league?
It has been a topic of discussion amongst casual fans for months, not surprising for a player whose skill set has been compared to Steph Curry and who has been called as important to the game as LeBron James in the post-Michael Jordan era of the NBA.
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The resounding answer from most WNBA experts: heck no. Just because she's the most decorated player in college basketball history doesn't automatically make her No. 1 on the pro stage on Day 1. But what do the MVP odds suggest?
Let's look at the WNBA MVP odds on BetMGM and further discuss where Clark might rank among the best players in the league.
Is Caitlin Clark the best player in the WNBA? What 2024 MVP odds say about Fever rookie
Odds (shorter than +10000) courtesy of BetMGM
| Player | Odds |
| A'ja Wilson | +110 |
| Breanna Stewart | +600 |
| Caitlin Clark | +1000 |
| Alyssa Thomas | +1100 |
| Brittney Griner | +1600 |
| Sabrina Ionescu | +1800 |
| Jewell Loyd | +2000 |
| Kelsey Plum | +2500 |
| Chelsea Gray | +3000 |
| Nneka Ogwumike | +3000 |
| Arike Ogunbowale | +3000 |
| Napheesa Collier | +3000 |
| S. Sabally | +4000 |
| Kahleah Copper | +5000 |
| Jackie Young | +5000 |
| Aliyah Boston | +5000 |
| Rhyne Howard | +5000 |
| Skylar Diggins-Smith | +6600 |
| DeWanna Bonner | +6600 |
Just looking at the odds, one might think that Clark is right there with two-time MVP A'ja Wilson and reigning MVP Breanna Stewart. The Fever rookie stands as the only other player with odds of +1000 or shorter, giving her an implied win probability of over nine percent (quite substantial for a rookie in an MVP futures board).
However — *record screech* —we have to pump the brakes.
What we see on awards futures for the major leagues doesn't simply reflect what oddsmakers believe will happen — the odds and ranked hierarchy have just as much to do with how bettors are spending their money, and what they think will happen.
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If a ton of Caitlin Clark MVP tickets go out, and Clark represents the vast majority of the betting handle (the total cash wagered on MVP), it stands to reason that sportsbooks might shorten her odds to limit their liability associated with her.
In this case, it appears going in that Clark would be an extremely popular bet, so she might have been proactively listed her at +1200 to win MVP to counteract the money pouring in. Take a look at the betting ticket and handle report for MVP:
| Player | Ticket % | Handle % |
| Caitlin Clark | 68.1% | 74.5% |
| A'ja Wilson | 6.0% | 12.6% |
| Napheesa Collier | 5.6% | 3.5% |
| Breanna Stewart | 3.9% | 1.6% |
| Aliyah Boston | 2.6% | 0.6% |
| Skylar Diggins-Smith | 2.6% | 1.0% |
| Alyssa Thomas | 2.2% | 0.9% |
| Jewell Loyd | 1.7% | 1.6% |
| Brittney Griner | 1.3% | 1.6% |
| Kelsey Plum | 1.3% | 0.7% |
| Sabrina Ionescu | 1.3% | 0.8% |
| Arike Ogunbowale | 0.9% | 0.1% |
| Nneka Ogwumike | 0.9% | 0.1% |
| Chelsea Gray | 0.4% | 0.4% |
| DeWanna Bonner | 0.4% | 0.1% |
| Diana Taurasi | 0.4% | 0.1% |
| Jackie Young | 0.4% | 0.2% |
Fascinating. Clark appears on over 68 percent of all WNBA MVP-related tickets, and she represents nearly three-quarters of all the money bet on WNBA MVP. For context, Victor Wembanyama closed the NBA season with 58.4 percent of the NBA Rookie of the Year handle, easily BetMGM's biggest liability in the ROY market (Wemby won the award in unanimous fashion).
Clark is a spectacular player — a superstar in every sense of the word. However, she's not even close to the MVP shoo-in many bettors seem to think she will be.
Wilson remains the best player on the best team in the WNBA, and the Aces have the rare opportunity to three-peat this season. And reigning MVP Breanna Stewart might mean more to the Liberty, the defending Eastern Conference-champions, than any other player means to their squad.
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Then there's Lynx superstar Napheesa Collier, reigning scoring champ Jewell Loyd, and Loyd's newly-arrived Seattle Storm teammate Skylar Diggins-Smith. Don't forget about the Sun's Alyssa Thomas and Jonquel Jones. All are perennial MVP candidates and all yield much more value than Clark at +1000.
When people seem to be betting with their hearts and not their heads, value can be found elsewhere. Chasing narratives and storylines on the futures market — and following the crowd — can be as futile as chasing losses in the live-betting market.
Everyone knows Clark is important to the WNBA, and for that matter the game of basketball as a whole. But remember: the public doesn't vote on MVP, and the media's votes are cast based on value, not popularity. If it was a popularity contest, Candace Parker would have likely won in 2023 and LeBron James and Wemby would have probably finished first and second in NBA MVP voting.
Clark will have her time atop the MVP race, just like Parker and LeBron over the years and just like Wemby probably will within the next half-decade. But just because she's the sports story of the past year doesn't mean she's the best player in the WNBA, and certainly doesn't mean she's winning MVP this October.
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