Every offseason, women’s basketball’s finest head abroad to take part in leagues that run concurrently with the NBA schedule. Unfortunately, that often creates a problem for the WNBA teams that have them under contract between May and the completion of their respective seasons in early fall. That’s why the most recent WNBA CBA, ratified in 2020, ushered in a prioritization rule which rendered players ineligible if their overseas season ends after the beginning of league training camps around mid-May finally went into effect this season and has become a unique hurdle of its own making.
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WNBA players need to supplement their income in the off-season
That rule has created a contentious battle between many of its players and the league. The reason WNBA players pull in a second income overseas is because of the WNBA’s relatively meager contracts in comparison to the salaries doled out overseas. A few stars were paid lucrative million dollar salaries to play in Russia and other European powerhouses, which is far more than the WNBA’s supermax salary of $234,936. However, since Brittney Griner’s imprisonment in Russia, the overseas options haven’t been as enticing of an option for the WNBA’s best. In response two-time WNBA MVP Breanna Stewart and All-Star Napheesa Collier have collaborated to form their own spinoff option for WNBA players in need of a domestic league.
At first thought, the idea of a second domestic women’s basketball league during the NBA season doesn’t sound financially feasible. However, the new league, called “Unrivaled,” is offering something different.
The new league would run from January through March and feature 30 of the top professional women’s players on six teams, playing games of 3-on-3 and one-on-one at a soundstage in Miami. Stewart and Collier’s goal is to raise enough dough in private funding and sponsorships to provide commensurate pay with what many of them make during the WNBA season but without the workload of an exhausting season in a foreign country.
Why it’s good for the WNBA
The last thing the WNBA wants are their stars suiting up for months abroad and then immediately ramping up for a long, arduous WNBA season. That sort of overuse is how you end up with top players on the mend with career-altering Achilles tears. Studies have shown that WNBA players suffer lower-body injuries at a 60-percent higher rate than their NBA peers. Stewart knows all about that. Her first Achilles tear occurred in April of 2019 while hooping for Dynamo Kursk during the EuroLeague Final Four, six months after she’d won the regular-season and Finals MVP for the Seattle Storm. Her second tear happened late in the 2021 season.
Unrivaled wouldn’t threaten the WNBA’s grip on its stateside women’s basketball monopoly. If anything, the WNBA should be thrilled by this development and should be rooting for the mini-league’s expansion. The new Unrivaled leg would run between January and March would be a showcase for the 30-best women’s players in the world, playing 3-on-3 and one-on-one.
It would be less gimmicky than Ice Cube’s Big 3 league, which features washed up NBA role players as its headliners. The most interesting aspect of Unrivaled is the Queen of the Court initiative Unrivaled proposes. The NBA’s top 30 players are too chicken to play 1-on-1 in public and risk getting their egos bruised by losing outside of a team setting. Hopefully that isn’t true for the women.
A chance to settle some scores and debates
Unrivaled would be the ideal venue to settle the A’ja Wilson vs. Breanna Stewart debate. Elena Della Donne might have something to say on the court about her place among the league’s top frontcourt players now that she’s healthy. Jewell Lloyd, Jackie Young, and Skylar Diggins-Smith getting to settle their beef with UConn’s best in a series of 3-on-3s would be an electrifying offseason idea.
Nneka Ogwumike vying to earn the title of the WNBA’s best guard in a double elimination tournament involving Lloyd, Sabrina Ionescu, and Young is actually a pretty sick idea for devoted fans and casual fans alike. One of the problems the WNBA has besides visibility on national studio shows to propel them into the national conversation is the visibility of its individual players. Step one of pushing your league into the next level are its stars being given a larger platform.
Of course, this would require some level of buy-in from the WNBA’s best players to participate, this could be the beginnings of a mutually beneficial business venture for the league and its stars.
Follow DJ Dunson on Twitter: @cerebralsportex
