Gap between Caitlin Clark's WNBA salary and her male counterparts draws outrage

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Lol @ no one watches womens sports so its ok to pay them worse

Caitlin Clarks most recent games have had more viewership than any basketball game in the last 5 years - including every single game in the NBA during that time.

There is literally no excuse to pay her less. She will be rolling in it with her sponsorships though.

Where is the money to pay the women supposed to come from if there’s no money from ticket sales and TV licensing?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So we are going to the Washington Mystics games this year? The interest in WNBA has to be sustained; it must be reflected in game attendance, merchandise sale etc., if we want to see the women’s salary increase.

I just bought ticket for when Caitlin Clark plays the Mystics in June. They were $175 for upper deck tickets! We normally go to 1-2 Mystics games a year and are used to paying $50 for lower level tickets. Crazy upcharge but that's the way it goes.

I looked online -- those are all resale tickets, not standard pricing. Mystics tickets for games later this month go for $30.

Blame the market and speculators. Same situation with Taylor Swift.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Protest Bowser. The city is subsidizing the Wizards and having the Mystics play in warehouse in South East

The "Entertainment and Sports Arena" where they play is owned by DC and taxpayers paid $69mln to build it.

[Anonymous]

Oh, well. She's a graduate of a decent college. She could find a better job if she wanted.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:But also, as we’ve seen with college basketball, until the WNBA gets equal coverage in terms of their games being on TV, coverage on sports center/ESPN etc, things don’t change.

this needs to happen to give the WNBA a fair shot at getting more interest in terms of viewing and attending games.

Do you think WNBA management is intentionally leaving money on the table and not signing lucrative TV deals?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Lol @ no one watches womens sports so its ok to pay them worse

Caitlin Clarks most recent games have had more viewership than any basketball game in the last 5 years - including every single game in the NBA during that time.

There is literally no excuse to pay her less. She will be rolling in it with her sponsorships though.

For some reason (I'm not honestly not sure why), people love to watch women's college sports but not women's professional sports.

It happens with softball too. the NCAA softball championships gets good viewership and is super fun to watch

But nobody watches the pro leagues. My family included. We hunker down and watch as much of the women's college world series as possible. but we tried to watch the pro games and ended up turning it off.

+1. I sort of followed the AU pro season on social media, but finding a way to watch was a pain.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t watch any sports, but even I know who this girl is. I assume (?) and hope she will get some big endorsements. She is a pretty girl and that will help her—think volleyballer Gabby Reese.

- my .02 which means nothing.

You sure about that?

Don't be that dick that trashes a talented athlete based on her looks. It's mean. And it's sexist.

She is not a pretty girl. That was what was challenged.
It is not sexist.

She's definitely going to get plenty of endorsement deals. Look at Prada dressing her for the draft.

Peronally she will get paid, one way or another.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Protest Bowser. The city is subsidizing the Wizards and having the Mystics play in warehouse in South East

The "Entertainment and Sports Arena" where they play is owned by DC and taxpayers paid $69mln to build it.

It's in a location that no one from the suburbs will ever visit. Capital one is funded by DC tax payers and has received hundreds of millions of taxpayer subsidies

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t watch any sports, but even I know who this girl is. I assume (?) and hope she will get some big endorsements. She is a pretty girl and that will help her—think volleyballer Gabby Reese.

- my .02 which means nothing.

You sure about that?

Don't be that dick that trashes a talented athlete based on her looks. It's mean. And it's sexist.

She is not a pretty girl. That was what was challenged.
It is not sexist.

That' is an irrelevant opinion to the discussion. And it is sexist when there is not that sort of focus on appearance on male athletes and their worth. That IS sexist.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t watch any sports, but even I know who this girl is. I assume (?) and hope she will get some big endorsements. She is a pretty girl and that will help her—think volleyballer Gabby Reese.

- my .02 which means nothing.

You sure about that?

Don't be that dick that trashes a talented athlete based on her looks. It's mean. And it's sexist.

She is not a pretty girl. That was what was challenged.
It is not sexist.

That' is an irrelevant opinion to the discussion. And it is sexist when there is not that sort of focus on appearance on male athletes and their worth. That IS sexist.

Well given the articles on how men who are talented athletes benefit from NIL deals in the NCAA while women who are only sort of talented but definitely willing to flaunt their looks on social media benefit more, there's reality to back it up. It just so happens that it's still true that NIL deals for women go more to women who are considered attractive. It doesn't seem to matter as much for men. And that stinks for really talented but not conventionally attractive female athletes. It just does.

Though I think there's substantial room to disagree on Caitlin Clark's looks.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Lol @ no one watches womens sports so its ok to pay them worse

Caitlin Clarks most recent games have had more viewership than any basketball game in the last 5 years - including every single game in the NBA during that time.

There is literally no excuse to pay her less. She will be rolling in it with her sponsorships though.

For some reason (I'm not honestly not sure why), people love to watch women's college sports but not women's professional sports.

It happens with softball too. the NCAA softball championships gets good viewership and is super fun to watch

But nobody watches the pro leagues. My family included. We hunker down and watch as much of the women's college world series as possible. but we tried to watch the pro games and ended up turning it off.

For softball, the NCAA decided to use that sport as a study to see if they could increase viewership by putting money into marketing.

Sounds like a study seeing if water is wet, but it worked.

Pro sports Have not the same.

But there are a few women’s pros force that people would rather watch like tennis

[Anonymous]

Shes well travelled well read

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Lol @ no one watches womens sports so its ok to pay them worse

Caitlin Clarks most recent games have had more viewership than any basketball game in the last 5 years - including every single game in the NBA during that time.

There is literally no excuse to pay her less. She will be rolling in it with her sponsorships though.

Sure there is. The WNBA earns a teeny tiny fraction of what the NBA does. Hopefully Clark and the other star players can change that so all the women get better salaries. In the meantime, marketing will bring the top players loads of cash, while the rank and file struggle along.

Add to that, the NBA subsidizes the WNBA. I'll say that again - the WNBA doesn't bring in enough revenue to pay even the meager salaries it offers now.

Don’t you dare say that again

Add to that, the NBA subsidizes the WNBA. I'll say that again - the WNBA doesn't bring in enough revenue to pay even the meager salaries it offers now.

PS - why not? It's true.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:People don’t watch women’s sports except perhaps tennis. So I think this is fair. Professional sports are a business, not an entitlement.

The NCAA men’s basketball championship (Purdue-UConn) drew a smaller TV crowd than the women’s final for the first time ever.

The men’s final on Monday (primetime): 14.82 million viewers.

The women’s final (Iowa-South Carolina) on Sunday (not in primetime): 18.87 million.
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/tv/tv-news/womens-ncaa-final-bigger-tv-ratings-than-mens-first-time-1235870291/

That's because they made the men's game much harder to access and also a crappier time slot.

This is all superfluous to the topic anyway. Clark makes far less money because the WNBA doesn't make any money. No one is entitled to a large paycheck just because they exist. Players like Clark will make more money professionally once the league starts making money. That's the way capitalism works. If women cared so much about it then they'd start spending money on attending women's sports, buying merch, and subscribing to streaming services to watch women's sports. You all have half the incomes anyway, so put your money where your mouths are. Sponsors are under no obligation to dole out billions in advert dollars to a league that isn't profitable at the moment, not hasn't been for the last 20+ years. What business person in their right mind would give a league billions of dollars when all it does is lose money?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think you need to look at viewership and game attendance and compare the two. Salaries for any players is dependent on income brought in, with a few standouts making (significantly) more.

Viewership and attendance to the WNBA is far less.

This.

When the WNBA is bringing in as many viewers and attendance is as good as the NBA and the merch is flying off the shelves, salaries will increase.

If anyone can help increase viewership in the the WNBA, it would be Caitlin Clark.

WNBA hasn't been promoted or invested in nearly as much as the men's side. So the "they don't bring in viewers" line becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Completely false. ESPN has tried to jam the WNBA down our throats for years. They air WNBA during fantastic hours on major networks and have so for years, yet hardly anyone watches.

The women's game just sucks. They chuck 3s and do layups. No dunking. Less physical. And their free throwing is often atrocious.

Women's tennis, in contrast, is good to watch because they can rally very well and don't see so hard like the men do that your just not watching ace after ace.