HoopsHype.com Columns

Should the WNBA survive?
by Clay Kallam / September 23, 2003

Vin Baker alone draws down more salary than the entire WNBA -- $2 million more, as a matter of fact.

And those NBA owners who whine about spending $12 million to subsidize the seven-year-old women's league surely realize that Shawn Kemp by himself is paid more than that.

Sure, everyone likes to save a dollar here and there, but the $3 million or so it costs to operate a WNBA franchise for a season is basically chump change for the high rollers in the NBA owners' club. And remember, some of the 14 teams actually turn a profit, and none lose much more than $1 million a season. To pull another example from the vastly overpaid list, Bryant Reeves got more money not to play last year than the WNBA needs to turn a profit for the next two years.

So the long-term survival of the WNBA isn't really about the money -- it's about whether that money is well spent.

Originally, David Stern convinced the NBA owners that an investment in women's professional basketball would pay off on the bottom line. They'd lose money for a few years, but then the franchises would start turning a modest profit, there'd be some marginal TV revenue, and everyone would be happy.

Unfortunately for that plan, the economy went south, the market for sports has softened and women's basketball proved a tougher sell than Stern and Val Ackerman, the president of the WNBA, thought it would be. So in terms of investment in a profit-making enterprise, the money the NBA has forked over so far has yet to return. That's not to say it won't, for it's certainly possible that, down the road 10 or 15 years, the WNBA will be just what Stern and Ackerman envisioned: a tidy little business that complements the NBA quite nicely. It's also possible the WNBA will always be a loss leader, which inevitably leads to this question: What does the NBA get for its money?

First and foremost, it turns the lights on in arenas 17 times a summer. Almost every NBA team owns or operates the arena it plays in, and the more times an arena is used, the more money the team makes. (Another factor over the past decade has been the shift in the rock and roll industry to outdoor venues. No longer do bands book the big arenas for summer shows; they play the outdoor amphitheaters, known as 'sheds' in the trade.) A WNBA team guarantees 17 dates every summer, and that's 17 days worth of parking, concessions and other income.

It's also worth noting that the arenas are just the first of many opportunities NBA teams have to play with the books. For example, they can charge a WNBA team rent, which essentially goes from one pocket to the other, and thus make the team seem more, or less, profitable than it really is. There are also some significant tax advantages, especially in the first five years of operation.

Second, the WNBA maintains the league's monopoly on professional basketball in the United States. Oh sure, you've got your Midget League and whatever else is out there in the hinterlands, but with the NBA, the NBDL and the WNBA, Stern and company have pretty much locked up the marketplace for professional hoops. If the WNBA were to fold, it would be immediately replaced by another women's professional league that would pick up the pieces, and the players, and roll into action without missing an opening tipoff. And if that women's league were successful, those owners just might take it into their heads to try and start up a men's league, and the last thing the NBA wants is any kind of competition.

Third, the WNBA is free publicity. It keeps basketball on the sports pages -- even if it is in the agate at the end of the sports section -- and generates some commentary and media coverage (if only antediluvians and sports talk bozos bashing women for a cheap laugh or two). And though Latasha Byears did get accused of raping a teammate this summer, in general the WNBA players are much better behaved than their NBA counterparts. Maybe that's because no one cares, or maybe that's because they don't have the money to indulge themselves (the top salary is $85,000), but overall, the WNBA's image in that regard is pretty good.

With those positives in mind, why is there any talk at all of dumping the league?

Though the WNBA is relatively cheap, it still does cost money, and for some of the inept bumblers who run NBA franchises, that's an issue. More important, some owners don't see how the league will ever make any money at all, and that it simply takes up too much time and energy to keep it going. That's especially true if the NBA franchise is struggling -- the focus clearly needs to be on the sickly goose that used to lay those golden eggs.

Another reason is that a lot of people are put off by the heavy lesbian quotient in the league (about two-thirds of the players, by most estimates). Though times are changing, there's still a lot of mindless homophobia out there, and for some reason the thought of women having sex with other women is just too much for some folks to bear. There are also a lot of gays in the stands, which has had an impact on attendance by straight families for some of the franchises in more conservative areas.

And finally, there's the tried-and-true barefoot-and-pregnant argument that believes women shouldn't really be doing this kind of thing, and should be back at home whipping up veal cordon bleu for dinner. (This is especially telling for those guys who fear, and rightfully, that a lot of the girls on the local high school team could whip them one-on-one.)

But none of those arguments are particularly compelling, except perhaps the first. So logically, there's really not much reason for the NBA to give up on the WNBA, at least until the present CBA runs out in 2007. There's a horde of talented players who will be drafted in 2004, including the charismatic Diana Taurasi, and the quality of play has steadily gone up (those who saw the last two games of the L.A.-Detroit series would be hard-pressed to deny that the women were playing entertaining basketball).

But is the WNBA ever going to be like the NBA? Of course not. Is it going to make a profit? Maybe. Is subsidizing the WNBA in whatever fashion going to significantly hurt the league? Not a chance.

Those questions, though, only set up the real one: Do NBA owners feel the WNBA is worth what it's costing them in time and energy?

That's a question only the owners can answer, and it's my guess they won't even address it until 2007. Next year is a lost season because of the Olympics, but 2005 and 2006 should show significant progress if the WNBA is to survive its childhood. If it doesn't, and if attendance continues to decline, owners continue to dump franchises and TV ratings disappear, then another dream will have died, murdered by ugly little facts of life.

In the meantime, though, ignore the haters. The WNBA is most likely going to be around for a while, for better or worse -- and it doesn't hurt the NBA, or the game of basketball, to just let the women play.

Clay Kallam is the publisher of FullCourt.com

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