You could think that a large salary courtyard would be a slam dark.
Basketball player Paige Bueckers, after helping Uconn on Monday at the 12th National Championship, was the No. 1 of the WNBA design of the Dallas Wings.
The three-time all-American first team made the night talk show racetrack, made headlines worldwide, and in a month Bueckers will make its WNBA debut when the Wings open their season against the Minnesota Lynx.
“It’s a great time to be in women’s sports,” said Bueckers Good morning America on Wednesday.
However, the latest star of basketball is expected to earn only 78,831 US dollars for their rookie year -around 109,480 US dollars or less than the real mean household income in the States. In comparison, No. 1 -Draft selection for the NBA can expect to earn $ 13.8 million in its rookie year, Spotrac, in its rookie year.
Nevertheless, Buster’s salary is not unexpected. The details are right there in the rookie content scale system in the WNBA collective agreement. And it is a small increase from last year when Caitlin Clark was collected with a start content in the first round with a starting content of $ 76,535 for their rookie season.
Breaking: Paige Bueckers signs a 3-year contract with unsurpassed (per) @kendra__andrews). The incomparable business of Bueckers is expected to exceed all of her projected 4-year WNBA rookie content after one year.
“The salary in the first year in the first year for the 10-week incomparable season will surpass what … pic.twitter.com/7GV8RWX8AE
However, this is associated with the news that Bueckers also signs incomparably on the 3-against-3 league, where she reports more in just one year than she could with the Wings in her entire four-year contract. And now some fans and industry observers call this a sobering memory of how little WNBA players are paid.
“It should be embarrassed,” said a fan on X.
“The economy of the WNBA just doesn’t add up … something is seriously broken,” wrote another.
“Paige Bueckers’ unsurpassed contract brings a future WNBA content in shame,” wrote the Pro Football and Sports Network website.
The rise of the WNBA
Women’s basketball has recorded a dramatic increase in popularity between the advent of superstar players such as Clark, the expansion of the WNBA and an increase in March Madness’s viewer in recent years.
Clark’s arrival was charged the WNBA last year, whereby the number of visitors in the league doubled almost 2023. The Indiana fever in January announced a new US US training system of 78 million US dollars, which is to be opened in 2027, which will take off its own room for the team, apart from the Pacers of the NBA.
“The fan dynamics for women’s sports have been grown for several years, and basketball was the focus,” wrote the rating company Nielsen in his 2024 Sport Wrapup.
According to Nielsen Fan Insights, interest in the league increased by 29 percent last year. The regular viewership for the season rose by 201 percent in 2024 last season and around 800 percent compared to 2014. About 3.4 million people were stopped in the WNBA All-Star game in July, Nielsen reported.
And in view of all this enthusiasm, it is not surprising that some people from Buecker’s’ WNBA content are so shocked, says Cheri Bradish, director of the future of the sports laboratory and chairman of the marketing management at Toronto Metropolitan University.
“The league business has apparently grown with new partners and programs – there is a suspicion that this is reflected in talents,” Bradish told CBC News.
“And now with competing leagues, society is aware that it is possible to compensate for these athletes better. The economy does not seem to sum up when the business model of salaries looks at.”
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People were influenced by reports on the figures of the audience, says Michele Donnelly, Associate Professor of Sports Management at Brock University in St. Catharines.
“This has made the landscape more lucrative for powerful and professional athletes than it actually is,” she said.
Why the wage discrepancy?
The 3-against-3 women’s basketball league, which was founded by the WNBA stars Breanna Stewart and Napheesa Collier, have just completed its opening season. According to Associated Press, players had an average salary of more than 220,000 US dollars in the USA -the highest average salary for players from all Sports Sports League and near the maximum basic salary in the WNBA.
The sports economist website says that the league “offers a new paradigm for how women’s basketball can prosecute”, has a top-class Primetime Square for TNT sports and achieved revenue through its 3-on-3 games and with “Fancotrotes”.
There are also some great supporters with millions of dollars in investments by US swimmers Michael Phelps and Milwaukee Bucks star Giannis Antetocounmpo.
But for many people, says Bradish, the shock results from WNBA salaries from the comparison with the NBA, where the starting salaries are in the millions.
Many players complement their income in the off-season abroad, a problem that was recently highlighted when WNBA player Brittney Griner in Russia was imprisoned for drug complaints that ended with a prisoner exchange. It came in a concrete manner last year.
“Getting an appropriate salary as a full-time professional athlete is something that is still needed in professional women’s sports,” said Donnelly.
Nevertheless, she warned, although some of the men’s professional sports are “astronomically high”, this is not the norm for athletes in these leagues. And the male athletes with the highest merits generally earn much more about their sponsorship and note than from their salaries or win.
WNBA contract negotiations come
The WNBA is a young league with its first season in 1997 and has no decades of contract negotiations behind it as the NBA does. It also has investments in investments and with less fluctuating and worse results in the areas of media rights.
In addition, WNBA players receive a much lower proportion of the overall revenue of the league than their NBA colleagues, although the current collective agreements will take place next season. The conversations between the league and the player association continue and the salaries are expected to grow.
Women’s football players at the FIFA World Championship will earn average a quarter of what the men did in Qatar last year, according to the figures published by the organization. What is behind this wage gap?
The players have stated that there could be a lockout if their salary requirements are not met. Bradish says she is hopeful These salaries will catch up and better business modeling for the compensation of women’s athletes will prevail.
“Undoubtedly, these women will present themselves well on the remuneration table through advocacy and collective bargaining,” she said.
However, the salary differences extend beyond basketball. For example, players in the professional women’s hockey league can only earn $ 35,000 a year. And last month, a FIFA report on women’s football showed that the average salary for top animal teams worldwide was $ 24,030, less than a livelihood wage in many places.
And despite 2024, the viral athletes like the US rugby player Ilona Maher and the Gymnast Simone Biles Olympic comeback did not set up the top 100 list with the highest paid athletes worldwide last year.
According to Sportico, Cristiano Ronaldo from Soccer exceeded this list with a total income of 260 million US dollars in 2024.
