Digging into the "pay us what you owe us" controversy in WNBA

The latest WNBA All-Star game was marred by a couple of things. For starters, the "Golden Goose" that is Caitlin Clark is injured so she could not participate at all, the actual main game was very lopsided and appeared as though it was an exhibition game with the players not truly going for it, and then there was the fact that all the players used this time to wear shirts demanding more money for the players in the league.

src

The internet went nuts with this and a lot of people were attacking the players for being unreasonable in demanding more money in a sport that many would argue is not entertaining or competitive and others would argue that it doesn't make any money so how can any money be owed?

Well they have a point, but I am going to stand up (a little bit) for the players especially towards one little piece of information that is almost certainly being misconstrued or misrepresented.

WNBA players have been crying for nearly 30 years about not getting paid enough and there are some people out there that used to pretend to be on their side about this even though if you were to dig into the numbers or just simply look at one of the televised games you could tell that there is no money to give them and that the salary they get already is giveaway money. Some named it the Welfare National Basketball Association because it was no secret that the WNBA was subsidized by NBA profits and to this day a majority of the teams are owned by the same people that own NBA teams.

The financial figures showed that the WNBA last around $10 million dollars a year, sometimes more. But the one figure that doesn't make a great deal of sense is where they say that they lost $40 million last year even though it was, by far, the biggest year the WNBA has ever had as far as viewership is concerned. Previously they were trying to trick us into watching the games, now people actually want to. This is largely because of the organic popularity of Caitlin Clark and anyone who says otherwise is kidding themselves.

src

The league tries to push this bit of information to the side stating that the $40 million loss comes from the new agreement that teams will get chartered flights instead of commercial, and also because the WNBA spent more money on advertising in the past year. Of course some of this can be believed but at the same time viewership both on TV and in person is WAY UP and seems to be wanting to stay that way as now other stars are emerging as well such as Paige Bueckers in Dallas who despite playing for what is arguably the worst team in the league, manages to sell a ton of tickets as well as jerseys.

src

Speaking of jerseys; Caitlin Clark's Indiana Fever jersey was the 2nd best selling jersey this year. Not the 2nd best selling WNBA jersey, the *2nd best selling basketball jersey. Only Steph Curry sold more and Caitlin sold more than Lebron James and well, everyone else.

The women are pushing for more money and I think they should get it to a certain degree but if they push too hard they might be digging for gold where there isn't any. This isn't to say that I think every single one of them should be making millions like their NBA counterparts, because that is ridiculous seeing as how the NBA is one of the most popular leagues in the world and brings in hundreds of times the amount of money. But if there is some cheating going on there, they should be paid more.

I think that people are gaslit into thinking that the WNBA players are being unreasonable and I would agree that some of them are such as when Angel Reese says that her $75,000 salary doesn't cover her rent. Girl, where are you living that costs $8000 a month? Maybe downgrade a lil bit?

But here is the main point that I am trying to make and that perhaps people out there shouldn't allow themselves to be rage-baited or gaslit into thinking that these women are just being greedy nincompoops. When a very large organization claims they lost a bunch of money there is a very good reason for you to be skeptical about this.

I lie as much as I can get away with on my own tax returns and I think most other people do as well. Hell, an entire chain of stores exist that will assist you in lying as much as you can reasonably get away with when it comes to paying your own taxes. If you can make a business appear as though it is losing money, you get a massive break on taxes and the extremely large accounting firms specialize in doing exactly that. When the WNBA commissioner comes out and states that the league that just finished having by far its best season ever is losing scores of millions of dollars, I think you should be very skeptical of what this person is saying.

I read up on it a bit and found out that many of the teams' accounting records are intermingled with other professional teams in a portfolio of sorts and it is the prime directive of these firms to maximize their own profits by any legal way possible. A lot of what takes place inside of accounting firms is intentionally misleading and intentionally complicated to discourage anyone from really finding out what is actually going on there.

Do I think that WNBA teams make a ton of money? Outside of the Indian Fever, no. But I do believe that they make more than zero dollars and the claim that they are losing $40 million sounds like a ton of nonsense to me that is done intentionally for tax avoidance. It happens in every other industry so why not this one?

The collective bargaining agreement (CBA) that is happening in October of 2025 between the players union and the WNBA I think it going to pan out like this: The owners will meet the players halfway, but not because everyone is happy and agrees on what is fair. I think that the owners are going to realize that if they are subjected to a serious and thorough audit it will be revealed that they are "cheating" on their income statements. In the interest of not having this information go public, they will make a deal.

I'm just saying to not join in on the WNBA hate trend that is going on right now just because a commissioner, without any real proof, claims the league is losing money. I don't buy it! Do you?