BY Mark Halpern
On April 4, 1996 the world was introduced to first ever professional women’s sports league the WNBA. The WNBA set the standard and now there are more Women’s professional sports than ever before. The league opened with eight teams for its first year and the teams were strategically placed in dominate NBA states at the time to try and grab some of those fans that would have to chance to watch Basketball played all year round between the NBA and WNBA. The leagues first teams were the Charlotte Sting, Clevland Rockers, Houston Comets, New York Liberty, Los Angles Sparks, Phoenix Mercury, Sacramento Monarchs and the Utah Stars. Some of the first players drafted were Rebecca Lobo (Liberty), Sheryl Swoopes (Comets) and Lisa Leslie (Sparks). These three set the standard of what the WNBA would become.
The WNBA is at it’s peak in terms of popularity, with stars like Caitlin Clark, Angel Reese, Sabrina Ionescu among others. This past weekend during the All-Star Game in Indianapolis, the players came out in Black T-shirts saying “Pay us what you owe us”. This was a message to the league in regards to the CBA, which expires October 31st. Players wearing the shirt included A’ja Wilson (ACES), Breanna Stewart (Liberty), Alyssa Thomas (SUN) and Sabrina Ionescu (Liberty). Let’s take a look at some numbers, National viewership for the WNBA is up 23 percent from last year and attendance is up 26 percent, the highest it has been in decades, and merchandise sales are up 40 percent. The WNBA has always had stars from Lisa Leslie to Sue Bird to Diana Taurasi. But now the league is deeper than ever before and has a lot of star power at once. One of the names that has transcended the league is Caitlin Clark, from her rise at Iowa to what she has done for the Indiana Fever has been amazing. The WNBA has become so popular that this year the Golden State Valkyries joined the league, there will be teams in Portland and Toronto next season, and by 2030 Cleveland, Detroit and Philadelphia will all have expansion teams. Starting next season a 2.2 Billion dollar broadcast deal, where games can be seen on ESPN/ESPN2/ABC, NBCUniversal (NBC, USA, PEACOCK), and Amazon Prime. So between the media deal, the increase in attendance and merch sales and the expansion teams (they paid a fee) is the WNBA saying they can’t increase the player’s pay?
Caitlin Clark, the face of the league is scheduled to earn $78,066 this season, next season she will make $85,873 and in 2027 she’ll make $97,582 and remember she is on a rookie contract and has endorsements. Breanna Stewart is making $208,400 on the season. To put this into perspective LeBron James, who like Stewart is on a one year deal will make 56 MILLION DOLLARS. Jayson Tatum, who isn’t going to play this season will make 54 million. ( Not sure if he gets it all or if there’s insurance.) Yes, the NBA plays more games than the WNBA, but it is much cheaper for someone to take their family to a WNBA game than an NBA game.
In conclusion I am all for equal pay. Will there still be a gap between how WNBA and NBA players are paid: Yes, but that doesn’t mean that the WNBA players don’t deserve a raise. They absolutely do, and now with the league as popular as it is these players deserved to be rewarded.
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