In spring 2020, because the COVID-19 pandemic upended the nation, WNBA commissioner Cathy Engelbert was locked down in her New Jersey residence. The league was going through a season on the brink proper as its stakeholders felt it had begun to assemble momentum.
In conversations with league house owners and gamers, Engelbert sensed in these early weeks of the pandemic the stress over what was at stake. With no season, the league confronted what she later known as an “existential” second in regards to the prospect of going darkish for 20 months.
“I don’t know if we might have made it, however I do know we wouldn’t be the place we’re at the moment with out having had that extremely aggressive 22-game season within the bubble,” Engelbert mentioned.
4 years after the “Wubble,” the league is celebrating the WNBA Finals between the New York Liberty and Minnesota Lynx as a capstone to its most profitable 12 months. The WNBA has by no means been in a greater place. Tv rankings are up. So is attendance. The league is driving a growth in curiosity and expertise, pushed by the regular excellence of longtime stars like A’ja Wilson and Breanna Stewart, and the arrival of Caitlin Clark. Three enlargement groups have already been named and one other is predicted. A profitable new media deal is about to start out in 2026.
LIBERTY LEVELS UP 🗽
The #WNBAFinals offered by @YouTubeTV is now tied at 1-1! Recreation 3 is about for Wednesday at 8pm/ET in Minneapolis 🔥 pic.twitter.com/sZOjIZSZZW
— WNBA (@WNBA) October 13, 2024
The progress has not been with out its rising pains. For years, WNBA gamers pushed for personal constitution flights for groups touring between video games — a typical apply for his or her friends within the NBA and most different main skilled sports activities leagues — earlier than the league granted them this season. Occasional high-profile video games have been moved due to scheduling conflicts, and followers have voiced frustration about merchandise and broadcast accessibility. Engelbert acquired criticism from gamers, together with an admonishment from the gamers’ union, final month for what they mentioned was an insufficient public response to the net harassment and abuse many mentioned they’ve acquired this season. The union has additionally routinely known as for extra transparency from the league on its funds and operations.
However the league stays on the ascent, and the selection to play in 2020 has been hailed by staff house owners as an essential springboard. “I feel it was among the best selections made within the historical past of this league,” Seattle Storm co-owner Lisa Brummel mentioned.
That call saved the WNBA within the consciousness of followers and created a strengthened participant physique. As essential, it continued to generate income by way of media rights and company partnerships.
A couple of months after the conclusion of the 2020 season, the WNBA made one other alternative that considerably affected its trajectory. It started a capital increase that has helped supercharge its attain and recognition. It didn’t have to return in from the shadows to take action. If not for that window of time, stakeholders say, the WNBA won’t be the place it’s now.
Earlier than Engelbert took over because the WNBA’s first official commissioner in 2019 — the league was beforehand run by presidents — she needed to interview with the league’s staff house owners. As she went across the nation, visiting all 12 markets, she heard the same chorus. After practically three a long time of looking for its footing, the WNBA’s energy brokers had determined it was time to develop. The plan, Engelbert mentioned, was based mostly on a easy concept: “Go large or go residence.” The league, they informed her, wanted extra capital.
There was no consensus on how a lot. Simply that it wanted extra to develop. Engelbert sought views from influential individuals round her. When she met Kobe Bryant late that 12 months, she mentioned he requested what the WNBA wanted. Engelbert handed alongside the will for extra capital and floated $50 million as a goal. That quantity turned out to be a fraction of what it later acquired from traders.
In early 2021, the WNBA put out a pitch deck to traders. The method was pushed, partially, by the Liberty’s possession group, which additionally owns the Brooklyn Nets and Blue Pool Capital, a non-public fairness agency. “On the time, we actually wanted that infusion of capital,” Liberty co-owner Clara Wu Tsai mentioned.
It was a brand new strategy by the WNBA. The NBA had helped arise the league over its first two-plus a long time in existence, however now it sought cash from different sources. The WNBA was brief on assets and manpower. It wanted investments to place into advertising and marketing and model constructing, digital innovation and to drive extra income.
A 12 months later, it closed a $75 million capital increase that got here with a $475 million post-money valuation for the WNBA. Michael Dell and Nike have been the biggest traders, in line with one supply with information of the increase who was not approved to talk publicly in regards to the settlement. Nike invested $25 million, in line with a number of league and business sources. Nike declined to remark. Engelbert didn’t dispute that quantity when requested however mentioned the sneaker firm was a pure accomplice.
“Nike known as and wished to make a considerable funding as a result of a part of their technique was to double down on girls’s sports activities,” she mentioned.
Buyers within the capital increase took a roughly 16 p.c stake within the league, with WNBA house owners and NBA house owners every splitting the remainder in half, and took most popular fairness. That offers them a precedence return on their funding with a 5 p.c dividend, mentioned one individual with information of the capital increase who was granted anonymity as a result of the individual didn’t have the authority to talk publicly in regards to the league’s monetary construction. Although they’ve non-voting shares within the league, additionally they have two observers on the Board of Governors.
“I used to be simply intrigued that there was this league the place the standard of the gamers is so nice,” Karen Finerman, Metropolitan Capital CEO and a WNBA investor, mentioned. “And but the league was struggling.”
The WNBA’s monetary state of affairs has improved since then, and high-ranking executives and house owners level to the increase as a cause. It helped supercharge the league’s development and put the WNBA in a spot the place it may benefit from the surge in reputation since 2020.
Elevated globalization was introduced as one of many makes use of of the cash. After taking part in a number of exhibition video games in Canada, a Toronto enlargement staff will start play in 2026. Engelbert mentioned the league want to play video games on varied continents. Final week, she singled out Mexico Metropolis for its curiosity in internet hosting competitors. The WNBA has additionally undergone a digital transformation after the increase, revamping its app and web site. That change additionally helped with its advertising and marketing efforts, as did will increase in promotional and paid media campaigns.
Human capital was one other space the place the cash was allotted. When Engelbert took over as commissioner, the WNBA had roughly 12 workers, she mentioned. It nonetheless works out of the NBA’s midtown Manhattan workplaces, however now it has greater than 60. It has gone from what Engelbert mentioned was a one-person advertising and marketing division to round two dozen workers there. The league employed its first chief advertising and marketing officer in December 2020.
“If we weren’t already making incremental progress in our enterprise, then the second that we’re experiencing proper now wouldn’t be as large as it’s,” Dallas Wings CEO and president Greg Bibb mentioned.
WNBA commissioner Cathy Engelbert took a “go large or go residence” strategy to working the league. (David L. Nemec / NBAE by way of Getty Pictures)
Engelbert believed the capital increase additionally confirmed the WNBA could possibly be a development property. That wasn’t all the time the case for groups across the league.
When Wu Tsai and her husband, Joe Tsai, purchased the Liberty in January 2019, they bought a corporation she mentioned was a distressed asset. James Dolan, the franchise’s first and then-only proprietor, put the Liberty on the market in November 2017, and moved it out of Madison Sq. Backyard a season later and into Westchester County Heart, the place they performed for 2 seasons.
“No one wished to the touch it,” Wu Tsai mentioned.
However, the Tsais discovered the franchise engaging. They acknowledged the ability of New York as a media market and knew how a lot the town beloved basketball. They believed there was a fan base simply ready to be reinvigorated.
Getting into the finals, New York has been re-energized and is seen across the league as one of many franchises answerable for elevating the bar. (Earlier than the WNBA carried out full constitution journey this season, the Liberty have been fined a league-record $500,000 for chartering their gamers throughout the second half of 2021.)
They reshaped the roster and the enterprise, too. In New York’s opener in opposition to the Indiana Fever, it recorded $175,000 in merchandise gross sales, a single-game file for the Liberty and the Nets. Attendance is as much as a median of practically 13,000 followers per Liberty residence sport, up 64 p.c from final 12 months. They’ve 53 sponsors, up practically 61 p.c 12 months over 12 months, with income generated from such partnerships up 68 p.c. Wu Tsai mentioned the franchise is heading within the path of profitability.
“I couldn’t be happier in regards to the demand for tickets for our video games, the curiosity from sponsors and the viewership,” Wu Tsai mentioned.
SOLD OUT DATES 🤩
Big shoutout to our Libs Fam for displaying up and out for a Recreation 2 win @barclayscenter 🗽 pic.twitter.com/KjNlFBzCWN
— New York Liberty (@nyliberty) October 13, 2024
They aren’t alone, in fact. Clark has served as an accelerant in a record-setting 12 months for the Fever (and league extra broadly). The Wings rebudgeted their ticket income thrice this season as a mirrored image of exploding curiosity, with indicators pointing to a different file 12 months subsequent season, Bibb mentioned. They set merchandise data and added extra companions, ones who aren’t simply native but additionally nationwide and worldwide manufacturers. They offered two half-percent possession stakes this summer time at a file $208 million valuation.
Transformations within the enterprise are also a part of what set the Wings up for a forthcoming transfer from Arlington to downtown Dallas. They’re focusing on to start working in a brand new apply facility by the beginning of the 2026 season. The Dallas Memorial Auditorium is present process a renovation and can function their residence area. “It simply modifications the sport for us,” Bibb mentioned.
The Chicago Sky, led by rookie Angel Reese, have skilled the same upswing.
“We now have respiratory room. Income is nice. Rising the highest line is nice. Folks coming to video games and promoting out arenas, that’s unbelievable,” co-owner and working chairperson Nadia Rawlinson mentioned. “What has occurred over the past 18 months has been nothing wanting extraordinary.”
A franchise-specific 40,000-square-foot apply facility is on the way in which in Chicago. The Sky broke floor on their new facility Oct. 9 with plans to open earlier than the 2026 season. They be part of Phoenix, Seattle and Las Vegas as franchises which have all just lately unveiled new amenities.
“Apply amenities are going to simply shortly grow to be desk stakes,” Rawlinson mentioned. “I feel it will likely be one thing most franchises, if not all, may have over the subsequent 5 years.”
She’s not alone in that perception. Storm co-owner Ginny Gilder mentioned she believes that in 5 years each franchise may have its personal apply facility. If that involves fruition, it will likely be another instance of how far the league has come.
“This was a leap (from) a few years the place individuals thought, is that this going to be sustainable?” mentioned Joe Soper, the governor for the Connecticut Solar. “Are there going to be groups selecting to fold or promote or relocate and simply making an attempt to get out as a result of they don’t know if financially it’s going to have the assist, regardless that the expertise is there on the courtroom. Now you’re getting this visibility, and everyone will get to see the expertise and the expansion.”
The WNBA has seen franchise valuations leap, and Engelbert mentioned she thinks they’ll proceed to rise “significantly.” It’s a stark distinction from a half-decade in the past when franchises have been offered at values within the single-digit tens of millions. Mark Davis, The Athletic reported in 2022, purchased the Las Vegas Aces for somewhat greater than $2 million.
This 12 months, the league drew an all-in charge of $125 million for the enlargement franchise in Portland, greater than doubling not solely what the league sought in enlargement charges when it began but additionally what it value the Golden State Warriors possession group to purchase in with the Valkyries.
GO DEEPER
How the Golden State Valkyries advertising and marketing themselves as the brand new WNBA enlargement franchise
This previous season, WNBA video games averaged a file 1.19 million viewers on ESPN platforms in contrast with a median of 1.56 million viewers tuning in to observe NBA regular-season video games throughout ABC, ESPN and TNT. And heading into the finals, the playoffs had been probably the most seen in 25 years. The league’s new media deal — price $2.2 billion over 11 years, and probably extra if it lands extra media companions, because it expects — may assist elevate valuations even larger. There was a lot constructive momentum, Engelbert mentioned, that the league determined to pause the seek for its sixteenth staff to reassess the place it stands and rent an funding banker to run it. She mentioned 10 to 12 cities are viable choices.
It’s certainly one of a number of methods the WNBA has needed to reorient itself on the fly.
“It’s fascinating to speak at the moment about the place we’re, however I feel it’s altering so quickly, and every little thing’s altering within the W,” Engelbert mentioned. “I inform my staff, every little thing’s modified, so don’t base this on final 12 months as a result of every little thing modified this 12 months and the way we ought to be fascinated about what’s subsequent for us.”
The subsequent few years will proceed to mould the league. The WNBPA is broadly anticipated to choose out of the present collective bargaining settlement, and there could possibly be a brand new one in place in 2026, the identical 12 months the brand new media offers kick in. The brand new CBA will decide what quantity of income gamers and groups get.
Gamers have pushed for larger salaries at a time when the WNBA has needed to cope with criticism that they aren’t being paid sufficient. Groups, after a long time of shedding cash, are hoping to quickly crawl into the black. Valkyries president Jess Smith didn’t dismiss profitability within the franchise’s first season.
Although the WNBA’s new media deal is comparatively flush, it gained’t all trickle right down to the groups in the identical approach it might within the NBA or NFL, which don’t have outdoors traders. The earnings the league distributes will hit groups by way of a waterfall course of, although staff house owners will get the biggest share.
However there’s a perception throughout the league that the WNBA is getting into a unique stage. Its latest prosperity, its stakeholders say, ought to grow to be regular.
“That is the brand new baseline,” Rawlinson mentioned.
(Illustration: Dan Goldfarb / The Athletic; photograph: Bruce Bennett/ Getty Pictures)