W.N.B.A.'s Popularity Booms, but Money for Players Hasn't Kept Pace

[RandySF]

Allisha Gray is a 29-year-old guard for the Atlanta Dream. She is six feet tall, speaks with a central Georgia drawl and smiles as if she’s keeping the best secret.

During the W.N.B.A.’s All-Star weekend, she jumped into a whole new tax bracket. Her salary this year is $185,000, but she earned an additional $115,150 on Friday by winning the league’s 3-point contest and skills competition.

The W.N.B.A. awards $2,575 to each winner in its skills competition, but most of Gray’s windfall came courtesy of a deal announced the day before between the players’ union and the insurance company Aflac, which agreed to pay $55,000 per winner.

Her situation illustrated a theme of the league’s All-Star festivities. There is more money than ever coming into the W.N.B.A. from sponsors, ticket sales and new media rights deals, like the ones announced on Wednesday, which are expected to be worth six times what its current deals are. The presence of the rookies Caitlin Clark and Angel Reese has exponentially increased interest in the league this season, and many fans of those two players have stayed to watch the rest of what the league has to offer.



https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/25/business/wnba-players-salaries-money.html

[JT45242]

1. This will likely be the first profitable wnba season.

Since it's inception, the WNBA has needed subsidies from the NBA owners.

Simply put, the WNBA was losing money and would have folded if not for millions of dollars for each team that the NBA gave.

The WNBA did not draw tv ratings or ticket sales that were as strong as women's soccer.

Pay will lag until the new collective bargaining agreement is signed.

Unlike Tesla, the wnba was not paying exorbitant salaries compared to its revenue stream.

The players will get their cut of the pie. It just needs to go through the evaluation of revenue which will adjust the salary cap.

[ProfessorGAC]

2. Ummmm.

They just signed a deal that will pay the league $200 million per year, for the next 11 years.
Their total revenue was $200 million. This new $200 million supplants $24 million in current national rights deals.
So, the revenues next season will be 88% higher. And, that doesn't count added deals for streaming, international TV, local rights, & merchandise. Added up, the increase is expected to take revenues to 2.25x current.
The new deal just happened. It was all over the news, as were the increases over current.
The premise of the article is flawed. Or it was written a month ago.