Was Caitlin Clark photographed at a 2025 WNBA All-Star event wearing a T-shirt that read "I Deserve NBA Money"? No, that's not true: The image is fake, posted to a self-described parody account. Authentic photos and video from a three-on-three competition showed Clark and other players all in identical players union protest T-shirts with the message: "Pay Us What You Owe Us".
The doctored photo appeared in a July 19, 2025 X.com post (archived here) by the @TheNBACentel account with the caption "Caitlin Clark's shirt:" and:
"I DESERVE NBA MONEY" 👀
Here's what the post looked like on X at the time this fact check was written:
(Source: Lead Stories screenshot of X.com post by @TheNBACentel.)
The account that published the post, NBACentel, is clearly labelled (see screenshot below) a parody account:
Non-parody sports coverage showed the identical photo, but Clark was wearing, with fellow WNBA players, the "Pay Us What You Owe Us" T-shirts. The slogan relates to the WNBA Players Association demand for a share of the league's growing revenues, not for salaries matching those of the NBA, whose $11 billion revenue dwarfs the estimated WNBA revenues of $200 million.
Below, a screenshot from Courtside Buzz's July 17 Instagram post (archived here), shows Clark in the exact same angle, background, and expression, which demonstrates that a real photo was digitally altered to create the parody post.
(Source: Lead Stories screenshot of Instagram post by @courtsidebuzzig.)
Readers will find other Lead Stories fact checks about Caitlin Clark collected here.
