Cities, investors vie for WNBA teams after record-setting season

The WNBA wrapped up its biggest season ever last month with eye-popping TV ratings, robust ticket sales and record revenue. Now, everybody wants in on the action. Franchise valuations are soaring, and a dozen cities are vying for teams as the league moves to expand and capitalize on its surge in popularity.

Philadelphia; Nashville, Tennessee; Denver; Miami, Jacksonville and Orlando, Florida; Milwaukee; Austin, Texas; Kansas City, Missouri; Charlotte, North Carolina; Cleveland; and Boston are interested in landing a team.

The league, which played the 2024 season with 12 teams, adds the Golden State Valkyries next year and two more expansion teams — one in Toronto and the other in Portland, Oregon — the following year.

Beyond that, the WNBA is in no rush, Commissioner Cathy Engelbert said.

Although the league has lost an estimated $280 million since its founding in 1996 and ran a $40 million deficit this year, the sense is growing that the business of women’s basketball has turned an important corner.

The owners of the NBA’s Golden State Warriors will pay $50 million to bring a WNBA franchise to California’s Bay Area. Toronto’s ownership group will pay the same, and Portland’s new owners will pay the league $125 million. That cost seems reasonable to potential investors who see a league taking the sports world by storm.

Attractive investment

The WNBA’s in-person attendance rose from 3.17 million in 2023 to 4.71 million this year, primarily because of the mass-market appeal of rookie sensation Caitlin Clark. The Indiana Fever guard’s games were often moved from modest WNBA arenas to NBA buildings to accommodate more fans.

When Clark came to Washington, the Mystics shifted from the 4,100-seat Entertainment & Sports Arena in Southeast to the 20,000-seat Capital One Arena, home of the Washington Wizards and Capitals in the heart of the city.

“We are able to show there is demand, and that’s exactly why there are cities wanting to have an expansion team,” said Ceyda Mumcu, a sports management professor at the University of New Haven. “Because they know people will be in the venues, which brings additional business to the city and the surrounding areas.”

TV audiences also soared. More than 54 million people watched at least one WNBA broadcast this year, and games featuring Clark set records for the league. Broadcasts on ESPN fared particularly well. The 1.19 million average viewers were only a tick behind the 1.6 million who watched a season-opening NBA doubleheader on the network in October.

“The WNBA has been waiting for this moment for a long time,” Ms. Mumcu said. “The external factors just eventually, in this moment, lined up to allow the league to accelerate.”

When she discusses “external factors,” Ms. Mumcu refers to the widespread media attention that Clark brought to the league in her rookie season. With a legion of fans desperate to see the Iowa product’s highlight-worthy performances, the WNBA’s premier broadcast partners dedicated more time and attention to the league.

For years, fans had to hunt down games on second-tier cable channels such as Lifetime or Oxygen or catch the action on digital platforms such as Facebook Watch. Some games aired on the lesser-known Ion channel, but many more were available this season on ABC, ESPN and CBS.

The broadcasts paid immediate ratings dividends for the networks. In July, Disney, NBC and Amazon Prime signed an 11-year, $2.2 billion media rights deal with the league. The agreement, which will allow for 100 national WNBA broadcasts each year, can be renegotiated after three years if the league’s ratings continue to grow.

For potential investors, joining the ranks of WNBA owners looks like sound business.

With ratings, attendance and merchandise sales rising, team valuations are soaring. Sportico estimated in June that the Las Vegas Aces were worth a league-best $140 million, providing 6,900% growth for owner Mark Davis, who purchased the team for $2 million in 2021.

“It’s a combination of everything,” Lisa Delpy Neirotti, director of George Washington University’s sports management program, said of the increased valuations. “But media rights, that’s what spurs growth in things. It’s the largest revenue source that the team has or the league has.”

Trouble in paradise

The stars responsible for the WNBA’s explosion, including Clark and Aces forward A’ja Wilson, want a bigger share of the financial rewards the league is reaping.

The players opted out of their collective bargaining agreement last month, just one day after the New York Liberty defeated the Minnesota Lynx in the most-watched WNBA Finals in 25 years.

“Opting out isn’t just about bigger paychecks,” said a statement by the Seattle Storm’s Nneka Ogwumike, president of the players union. “It’s about claiming our rightful share of the business we’ve built, improving working conditions, and securing a future where the success we create benefits today’s players and the generations to come.”

Despite the league’s growth, WNBA salaries often fall within the five-figure range. During her rookie season, Chicago Sky forward Angel Reese made $73,439 from her playing salary.

“I just hope y’all know the WNBA don’t pay my bills at all. I don’t even think that pays one of my bills,” Reese said on Instagram Live after the season. “Does that even pay my car note?”

As social media naysayers point out, the WNBA doesn’t generate the revenue of a juggernaut like the NBA. Still, Reese and her cohorts aren’t looking for LeBron James money; they want equity.

In the major men’s leagues, the revenue split between players and owners is 48% to 51%. After years of bargaining, NFL players receive 48.8% of the league’s revenue. NBA players collect about 50% of “basketball-related income” from their league. Meanwhile, the WNBA’s athletes took only a 9.3% cut of their league’s revenue under the old collective bargaining agreement.

That arrangement won’t work for the players after this season’s unprecedented success, even if they risk a lockout.

“The WNBA is on such a positive trajectory, a lockout is the last thing they need right now,” Ms. Delpy Neirotti said. “They’re going to have to appease players, and the players are going to have to be reasonable.”

Fresh blood

The WNBA is entering a new era with a fresh collective bargaining agreement on the horizon. Owners, players and coaches are feeling the shift. Less than a month after the season ended, seven of the league’s 12 teams had head coaching vacancies.

Underperformers were the first to go, but coaches who took their teams to the playoffs in 2024 weren’t spared either. The Fever fired coach Christie Sides after she took the team from a last-place finish in 2023 to a postseason berth this year. Former Connecticut Sun coach Stephanie White lost her job after back-to-back appearances in the WNBA semifinals.

White quickly found a new gig, replacing Sides as the coach of the Fever, while Reese’s Sky hired former Aces assistant Tyler Marsh to lead the team.

Ms. Mumcu theorized that the changes could attract new blood, similar to what occurred as women’s college basketball grew in popularity.

“When we look at the history, there were a lot more women coaches in the women’s college basketball space,” she said. “Once the salaries reached a certain level, there was a lot more interest from men to coach a women’s program.”

A coaching change could also be part of a broader effort to use this season’s success as a springboard.

“Now that the business has become more in the public eye, they want to be more assertive,” Ms. Mumcu said of the WNBA’s owners. “There’s always an intention of, ‘How are we going to stay on top of mind? How are we going to reach success on the court? And what does that next level look like?’”