Ryan Clark in a Pivotal Conversation reflects on wild week of headlines and stories stemming from RG3 comments, his take on families, clarifies his stance and recent Angel Reese and Cailtin Clark discussion

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Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

  Now, more than ever, we need someone on our side. But Rob Whitman? Whitman's votes drove up costs, cut Medicaid, and risked 350,000 Virginians' health care to pay for tax breaks for himself and his donors. He's not on our side. Shannon Taylor will fight corruption, cut taxes, and bring down costs. This November, vote for Shannon Taylor. She's for us. Paid for by HMP, the House Majority PAC dot com. Not authorized by any candidate or candidate's committee.

• 0:35Ryan Clark?

  Welcome to the pivot. I mean, a little bit ago, we started some different things, having pivotal conversations. I never thought that a transition into me having to have one by myself, about me, about things that I've said, and about things that have affected not only me, but others. Obviously, the talk of the week has been the back-and-forth between myself and RG3. All of it started over an Angel Reese take that he felt was a sports take that I didn't feel that way about. I felt it was away from the court. I felt that it was away from basketball.

• 1:17Ryan Clark?

  And because of the personal feelings I have about RG3, I took a take that was personal to another person and made it personal to myself. And I shouldn't have done that. I shouldn't have brought his wife into an equation, even though in my mind, before speaking about her, I processed as much as I possibly could to speak of her in a way that was positive, trying to make sure it only illustrated a point about the way that he approached Angel Reese. And in that, in some ways, and to some people, I probably missed a mark.

• 1:59Ryan Clark?

  I have a lot of experience with RG3. I know some things about him personally. I'm not going to say that we are close. I'm not going to say that we are friends. But those things already imprinted in my mind, those feelings, already things that have developed over our experiences together, over some things that he said to me, done to me, probably some things I've said to him. They played a part in how I felt. Now, he's done some things that I haven't commented on because I didn't want or need to attack him. And in this case, I wanted to defend a young black woman, which ended up being an attack on him.

• 2:42Ryan Clark?

  He felt, or at least he said, an attack on his family. And that was never the case, or never the intent of mine. When I look back at this, I think a larger thing that has now happened is people who love and people who know me have now had to come to my defense because they know my heart, they know my actions, they know the intent of my words. By bringing in, maybe, I can't speak for these people, by speaking about RG's wife, it's now brought my family into the equation, or Yanka into the equation, or my children, Jordan, Logan, Jaden, into the equation.

• 3:24Ryan Clark?

  I certainly didn't want them to have to be sort of the casualties of my Twitter or my media wars. Yanka, in particular, has taken a lot of heat, has taken a lot of hate. All she's ever done is give her life to her family. All she's ever done is make sure all of our kids, yes, that includes Jaden and Jordan and Logan, had the best home life, the most present mother, the best provider, the best support system that they possibly could. And then after that, after taking care of that family

• 4:06Ryan Clark?

  for decades of her life, she's now moved on into getting a degree, getting a master's, starting a PhD program, and now working to counsel and take care of others. I don't think she deserves, not I don't think, she does not deserve the hate that she got because of me. To her, to my children, I am sorry. I have to start to think about how my words impact, who they impact, and the effect of the fallout on you guys. So that leads me to Greta Griffin. Let me say this before getting into reasoning, before getting into thought process.

• 4:48Ryan Clark?

  She should not have been brought up in me trying to make a point about how having black women close to you and the things that you learn from them can help you in the way that you approach and speak to and about them. She didn't need to be the illustration of that. I could speak positively about what they are without making the insinuation that is something that non-black women don't do well. I'm doing the exact same thing, or it may have seemed that I did the exact same thing to her that I'm trying to keep people from doing to black women. My thought process was, in seeing certain clips on my algorithm, on my timeline,

• 5:34Ryan Clark?

  they do a podcast together. In that podcast, they talk very openly about not being black enough. They talk very openly about biracial kids, what it's like to not be accepted in the black community. They very rarely talk about black women. In the video that RG3 posted that I felt like mocked Angel Reese, she was in the background. Then I love the optics of RG3, a black man, attacking and imitating, and what I felt insulting, mocking a black woman as his wife was in the background, almost seemingly as a prop

• 6:17Ryan Clark?

  of, and this is my feeling, of what was good, aiming, nodding along, and applauding what I felt like was a personal attack. I didn't. But that doesn't mean because I have that feeling about what you do to someone else that I could do that to you. So, to Greta.

• 6:37Ryan Clark?

  I was out of line, I was out of bounds, I apologize. To all of the people that don't like RG's take, or takes, or the way that he moves, or even if you just in this conversation, take my side and want to support me, leave his family alone. It doesn't take a daily attack on his wife, on his children, to remind him that you think his take, his takes, or whatever it is, is the wrong thing to you. Families should be off limits. I started that by bringing her into it.

• 7:19Ryan Clark?

  I see that now, no matter what my intent was, the impact was different. If I had to do it all over again, I would do it a different way. And in doing it all over again, instead of pointing to what non-black women can't do, or don't do, or the conversations I don't feel like they can have, I should have pointed to what having a positive black woman in the household could do. I think back to Alexis O'Handian, when he was on our show, he talked about being married to Serena Williams and the things that he has learned through not only the conversations they've had, but through the life they've experienced. He brought us back to childbirth.

• 8:04Ryan Clark?

  Many of us know how high the mortality rates are in this country for black women. But clearly, that wouldn't extend to Serena Williams. That wouldn't also include one of the world's greatest athletes of all time. But it did, and it taught him a lesson. I feel like those lessons are invaluable.

• 8:29Ryan Clark?

  In understanding, in feeling, in being empathetic to what black women go through. Alexis has now become a champion in support of not only black women, but all women. Alexis has now become one of the leading voices in pushing women to the forefront. He's also become one of the leading voices in understanding the need to protect black women. See, it is those conversations, it is those opportunities and experiences that change you.

• 9:09Ryan Clark?

  That doesn't mean you can't get them from your mother, doesn't mean you can't get them from your sister. As a man who is close to his family and has a mom and has a sister, I know we don't speak every day, even if I should be better. I know I don't share with them constantly about what they're going through. But you do know, when you have a woman in your household, when you're, when you're married, when it's your significant others, those are the conversations you have daily, and those conversations can change you. So it's not about what a non-black woman can't bring.

• 9:49Ryan Clark?

  It's about the clarity, it's about the levity, it's about the level of understanding and conditioning that having a black woman around can bring. It doesn't mean that that's the way you have to choose. You love who you love, and I believe that everybody's created in God's image. But in that, that person will shape your experiences. And it's that sort of front row seat to their lives that impacts the way that you move, the way that you react, the way that you act, the way that you behave, the way that you speak. And it impacted me walking into that, you know.

• 10:36Ryan Clark?

  How the algorithm works, there's a lot of podcasts that pop up on my timeline. And I was seeing so many of these podcasts, whether it be former athlete or these relationship podcasts. And the question would often be, why do black men date outside of their race? The first thing I thought about is either other men of other races aren't answering this question, or don't date outside of their race enough for it to be a question. Because I never hear their answer. And so it doesn't feel, at least to me, that they are constantly having to justify their choices in relationships

• 11:17Ryan Clark?

  by propping up another set of women over women that look like them. And it was starting to be that feeling that it seemed that when men, when black men talked about why they dated outside their race, it was because the other women were more of this, or less of something negative. Rather than saying, it's not about whether I'm dating a black woman or a woman outside of my race. It's about dating the particular woman I'm dating and I care for her. And that was on my soul because I didn't feel like we had to demean and put down black women to say why we chose to love who we love.

• 12:01Ryan Clark?

  And in my proximity to black women, getting home from the draft and having the conversation about how refreshing it was to see Rakeya Jackson sitting next to Pierce when he was drafted. And it wasn't just about her beauty or the beauty of the couple. It was because in today's young athlete world, she's actually sort of becoming the minority when it comes to black athletes. She's becoming the anomaly. And in having young black daughters, there is the concern of, will you be able to find someone to love you based on the optics of that?

• 12:42Ryan Clark?

  And so that was on my heart in walking in to speak about RG3. And instead of taking those two things as separate thoughts, I thought, here's the time to do it. And in doing that, I wasn't clear on what I was trying to say. I wasn't trying to say that all people that date outside of their race are like that. I was trying to say there's a particular sect of people. And it was on my heart as it pertained to RG3 because in all of his clips, I never truly see he or when he's doing his podcast, that's a co-hosted podcast. I never see them talk about the value of black women.

• 13:28Ryan Clark?

  And the first time I get to see you talk about it, it's to say or to attack, at least in my opinion, one of them personally. And so now I've mixed two things that didn't necessarily have to go together. And in mixing those two things, I lumped a group of people into an always category that I shouldn't. I called a dear friend of mine named Amanda. Amanda is a blond-haired woman who is married to a close family friend of ours, Paul. They are both family friends. They are both family. And I messaged her and I said, can I please give you a call? The first thing I asked her was, did I offend you? Did my words hurt you?

• 14:13Ryan Clark?

  And we had about a 40-minute conversation about the things that I said. And she said, and normally you articulate things so well. She said, but I couldn't find the separation between what you were talking about and us.

• 14:27Ryan Clark?

  I failed there because when I look at Amanda, I don't see someone that is propped up because of her skin. I don't see a man in Paul who only loves his wife because of her skin color and then puts down black women in order to justify that. It also doesn't mean that Amanda isn't extremely conscious about having decisions that affect the world of African-American people because she knows she's raising two black boys. So not only to Amanda and Paul, because I'm close to them, but to any woman who not only loves a black man, but loves black people and stands in the gap for them and works to not only be an ally,

• 15:12Ryan Clark?

  but works to empathize and understand, I see you. I wasn't talking about you. And if you feel like I lumped you into that category, I was wrong, and I apologize. To any man who is black and dates outside of his race and just loves that woman, yet stands in the gap for that woman he loves and also for people that look like him, that has empathy and sympathy and compassion and understanding for them, I wasn't talking about you either. I do get how I need to be much more clear about what I say, about what I feel, and not think to myself, I need to get all of this said right now because this is the opportunity

• 15:56Ryan Clark?

  to express what I want to express. That's ego. That's selfishness. And you can't be a leader with those qualities, and that's on me. Part of leading is being a father, which is the most important job in my life, and I treat it as such. I have three babies. Jaden was my first. Jordan is my son in the middle, and Logan. I had Jaden when I was 19 years old. I've told this story many times on this show. I have posted my child as much as I post all of them. I've also had custody of her since she was four. And because it was,

• 16:41Ryan Clark?

  how can we attack not only Ryan's statement, but how can we attack him? It was brought up by people like Le'Veon Bell and Marcellus Wiley that...

• 16:53Ryan Clark?

  I had a biracial child. Duh. Marcellus Wiley actually went on a rant a while ago to say, we get it. You had a baby with a white woman. And now, all of a sudden, it's news as if I was trying to hide her. And Le'Veon Bell says, I blocked him because of, that's not why I blocked you. I blocked you because you were annoying me during the election. And I don't get to tell you who to support, or how to support, or how to behave. I do get to make a choice of whether or not I listen to you. When Jaden was born, I was nineteen, I was in the South, and I needed to be a great father. I wanted to be a great father. I was close to her family.

• 17:38Ryan Clark?

  When we found out that we were going to have this child, certain things changed, certain feelings changed, but eventually, it all came back around because we loved that child. And when I got custody of her, and when I raised all three of my children in the same house with the same woman, Jaden shaped my views on life. There are often these conversations that go on in our community about telling our children the importance of black families. I believe that's extremely important to have our men marry women that look like them so we could continue the lineage that at one point was all we had.

• 18:21Ryan Clark?

  But I was always different about that because of how my baby looked. Because of what I felt like would be the hypocrisy to say, you can only date people that look like you because that wasn't the way I grew up. That wasn't the decisions I made. Nor do I feel you're bad if you do that. I have no issue with interracial relationships, obviously. Maybe that was confused or misconstrued in what I say. I think we're all created in God's image. I do believe that certain relationships teach you certain things based on experience. I always told my kids, it's not about... What the person looks like that you love.

• 19:05Ryan Clark?

  It's not about the color of their skin, but the content of their hearts and the impact of their actions. Yes, my children have dated outside of their race. And yes, I have loved the good people they have brought home to us. Not because of skin color, just because of who they were and how they loved my children. Jaden taught me that. It was something I already knew before her, but she taught me that. And because I had her, it shaped my views on the world. It shaped my views on love. And so when I posted her, like, I didn't know this was a secret. She and I both had a good laugh about it.

• 19:50Ryan Clark?

  And when she sent some of the pictures over that she still had in her phone, she said, "And here is our favorite, Dad." And it was me and her, my second year in the league, outside of Cowboys stadium as I played for the Giants. We didn't know life would take us to this point, but we knew then we had each other. And we still do. And having each other, it also seems that Katelyn and Angel have each other. I think they're both amazing for basketball. I also think we've started to use them as pawns in some sort of agenda we have on each side, and we need to stop. And I was a part of that this week.

• 20:35Ryan Clark?

  Even if indirectly, I was. And I can't play into that any longer. Katelyn Clark, for all it's worth, is absolutely freaking phenomenal. The excitement she brings to the game, the skill level she brings to the game, the way that she plays it. Honestly, the way that she also pays tribute to those who came before her. It's actually, in my opinion, it should be impossible to hate her. Do her fans and the way that they attack others play into it? Absolutely. Does it feel like there's a racial component to that? Absolutely. But the game needs her. The game needs to market her. The game needs to push her forward, and she is pushing the game forward.

• 21:19Ryan Clark?

  But it also doesn't mean because you love Katelyn Clark, you can't also respect Angel Reese.

• 21:28Ryan Clark?

  I get it. If you want to talk about her game and say that they aren't on the same level, that's a conversation you can have. I think Katelyn Clark is on her way to be in the face of the league after Asia Wilson is gone. I think Angel Reese is also a very important part of the league because the effort she plays with, the star power she has away from the court is another reason why people will tune in to the WNBA. Because whether you like her or love her, or don't like her or love her, you want to see what Angel Reese is going to do. And that's good for a league that wants you to turn on the TV to see it. So why can't we respect both ladies?

• 22:12Ryan Clark?

  Why can't if you're African American, you look at simply the skill set of Katelyn Clark and respect what she's going to do, what she has done without being a coon, without being a sellout? And why, if you love Katelyn Clark and you aren't a black person, does Angel Reese have to be her villain? The two can coexist individually and be good for the game collectively if we let them. And moving forward, I'm going to let her. The hardest part about weighing in on a lot of things, whether it be sports or non-sports, is that people just read headlines, which I realize every time I say something.

• 22:57Ryan Clark?

  And I do believe it's because they try to kind of shut off once race is involved. I do believe things in this world have racial components to it. I don't believe everything is. And I don't believe everything that has a racial component to it is racism. It is a word, though, that I think now people who want to not necessarily protect racism, or maybe just don't want to hear about it initially, or immediately say you're race baiting if you bring it up. Right? Race baiting is trying to incite aggravation or incite anger as it involves race relations in order to have some sort of political or personal gain.

• 23:39Ryan Clark?

  Fighting for the equality of minorities is not in any way going to give me or anybody else political or personal gain.

• 23:52Ryan Clark?

  But it may incite anger. It may incite anger that equality and the treatment of all people is important to you. Because it is important to me. And I try to bring it up in the cultural nuances of sports sometimes. But those things get twisted in the headlines. Shador Sanders, for instance. I was speaking about the coverage of Shador Sanders, not the actual draft stock of Shador Sanders. And I said to myself that his bravado, his confidence, the way he's unapologetically himself and unapologetically black can play into why we're hearing the anonymous sources that are allowed to be reported on so often.

• 24:36Ryan Clark?

  Because the people who are covering him are slightly uncomfortable with the unfamiliar way in which he is approaching not only interviews, but the way that he is approaching a process. And everybody went, "Oh, my gosh, let's write the title that Shador Sanders is falling because he's black." I never said that. Because that would actually make me stupid. When I know the number one pick is going to be Cam Ward. When I know that Lamar Jackson has won two MVPs. When I know that Dak Prescott is the highest-paid quarterback in the NFL. When I know that Patrick Mahomes is the best player in the NFL.

• 25:16Ryan Clark?

  I get that my brand is important. I get that I want to push it forward, but I also want to push us forward as we come together. Maybe the way that I've been approaching getting everyone to be treated equally

• 25:34Ryan Clark?

  is something that causes dissension because you feel like you have to be on either side of it. Going forward, I will work to bring people together. I will also work to make sure that the voiceless, that the dismissed, that the devalued have a voice in me. That is part of me that I can't change. The part I can is being clearer. The part I can is being more thoughtful. And making sure that as I bring up

• 26:05Ryan Clark?

  One particular group of people, I don't bring down the other. I'm gonna still be like this. This is who I am. I don't really wanna change it. But I will change this. If you got something to say about me on Twitter, if you got something to say about me on your videos, which seems popular to make for some people, then say it. I ain't responding.

• 26:28Ryan Clark?

  It's not worth it to me. You aren't worth it to me. But it's certainly not worth it for my family to have to defend me. For my friends to have to defend me.

• 26:39Ryan Clark?

  For people who have an investment in who I am, to have to wonder if I'll have my job the next day. Robert's reaction to what I said wasn't to engage me in conversation. It was to call for me to be fired. I don't know what those next steps are. I do know that I've known him for 12 years. I've worked with him in two separate occasions. And I supported him in both of those. Whether it was just a letter to be yourself, whether it was speaking to the locker room about getting behind him. No matter what our personal thing was, I knew that he needed someone to have his back when he wasn't around.

• 27:24Ryan Clark?

  I allowed some of the things that happened between us to seep into my thought on what at least he thought was a sports take. To take this entire thing to a place where it shouldn't have been. It is my job to build up all people. It's my job to be as positive as I can about humanity. More importantly, it is never my job to tear down another black man, no matter how I feel. For that, for the community that I represent, for the community that I wanna push forward.

• 27:58Ryan Clark?

  I feel that I've set us back in a little bit. I have put us in a place to now we are pitted against each other. Let's not be pitted against each other. I have nothing else to say about him. I have nothing else to say about that take. And I wanted to do this because if everybody else was going to talk about what I meant, I felt it would be good to tell you what I meant myself. Love who you love. You can't control that. You can only control how you love them. Say what you want to say. You can't control how people comprehend it. You can only control the thought that you put into it. Work as hard as you possibly can. Cause you can't control how that work is received.

• 28:43Ryan Clark?

  But you can control the effort in which you work with. And be kind. You don't get to control how people feel about you. But you do control how you treat them. I appreciate y'all tapping in. Pivot fam, thank you for pivoting with me. And to everybody that supported me, I am so, so grateful.

• 29:05Speaker 00

  Now, more than ever, we need someone on our side. But Rob Whitman? Whitman's votes drove up costs, cut Medicaid, and risked 350,000 Virginians' health care to pay for tax breaks for himself and his donors. He's not on our side. Shannon Taylor will fight corruption, cut taxes, and bring down costs. This November, vote for Shannon Taylor. She's for us. Paid for by HMP, thehousemajoritypack.com. Not authorized by any candidate or candidate's committee.