2024 WNBA MVP Odds: Caitlin Clark among favorites

Caitlin Clark, the women's college basketball sensation and first-overall pick in the 2024 WNBA Draft, is among the favorites to win the league's MVP Award in her rookie season.

If she wins the MVP Award in her rookie year, Clark would join Candace Parker, Yolanda Griffith and Cynthia Cooper as the only players to do so.

Neither Griffith nor Cooper won the Rookie of the Year Award in their MVP-winning first year, while Parker took home both awards. It should be noted that Cooper won the MVP Award in the WNBA's first year of existence when she was 34, while Griffith won MVP two seasons later at 29 years old.

2024 WNBA MVP Odds

A'ja Wilson	+110
Breanna Stewart	+700
Caitlin Clark	+1000
Alyssa Thomas	+1100
Sabrina Ionescu	+1600
Jewell Lloyd	+1800
Kelsey Plum	+2000
Brittney Griner	+2000

Only two previous WNBA MVP winners remain in the league - A'ja Wilson and Breanna Stewart - but they have each won the award twice.

To gain perspective on what Clark needs to do to be the league's second player to win Rookie of the Year and MVP in one season, let's look at the stats of Candace Parker in the year she accomplished that feat.

Playing for the Los Angeles Sparks, Parker averaged 18.5 points (fifth in the league), 9.5 rebounds (first in the league), 3.4 assists, 1.3 steals and 2.3 blocks (second in the league). She also finished in the top 10 in field goal percentage (52.3 percent) and finished first in win shares with 7.7.

The main differences between Clark and Parker are size and position: Parker is a 6-foot-4 forward/center while Clark is a 6-foot point guard. Parker averaged 0.8 three-point attempts per game while Clark will likely attempt close to 10 each night.

Also, Parker's arrival in LA helped turn the team around, but three-time league MVP Lisa Leslie returned from a year off for Parker's rookie year. The Sparks went 10-24 in 2007 to land the top pick that they used to draft Parker, and the team went 20-14 and made the Western Conference Finals in 2008, her first season.

Clark won't have a three-time MVP lining up next to her with the Indiana Fever, but she does have 2023 first-overall pick Aliyah Boston on her new team as well as veteran guards to learn from in Kelsey Mitchell and Erica Wheeler.

It is a lot to ask from any first-year professional player, but if Clark can finish the season in top 10 in the league in points, rebounds and assists per game while leading the Fever to a winning record, she'll have a great chance at taking home the MVP Award as a rookie.

Odds displayed in this article were correct at the time of writing and are subject to change.