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WNBA setting up for long-term success with Bay Area expansion, expected 14th team – Sports Business Journal
WNBA Commissioner Cathy Engelbert “expects to add another franchise” alongside the newly announced Bay Area team to “give the league 14 teams” in 2025, according to Doug Feinberg of the AP. Ahead of Game 1 of the WNBA Finals yesterday, Engelbert said, “The goal is to add a second one, or 14th team, by 2025.” She added, “Not more for before ’25 but obviously longer term. …We have a lot of cities interested, which is why we didn’t announce the 14th team yet.” Engelbert “mentioned a few cities” including Denver, Philadelphia, Charlotte, Nashville, and Portland, which is “considered a front-runner.” Portland had a WNBA team from 2000-02, and there has been a “strong women’s basketball fan base” in the state over the past few seasons with the success of Oregon and Oregon State on the college level (AP, 10/8).
BUILDING LEVERAGE: In L.A., Masunaga & Nguyen reported the WNBA is “coming off its most-watched season in 21 years.” The ratings boost is “likely to make the league’s media rights negotiations in 2025 its highest-stakes deal yet.” With the option for players to opt out of the collective bargaining agreement “looming next year and expansion on the horizon,” the high viewership numbers are a “linchpin for charting the WNBA’s financial future.” The WNBA‘s viewership across ABC, ESPN, ESPN2 and CBS was “up 21% compared to last season.” Fans also “flocked to games in person, boosting attendance 16%” compared to the previous year. While the league “celebrates opening the path to more viewers and increased advertising appeal,” players are “keeping an eye on smaller ways the WNBA can grow” (L.A. TIMES, 10/8).
GOLDEN OPPORTUNITY: ESPN.com’s Alexa Philippou noted Engelbert has spoken about the “importance of finding the right new owners to bring into the league during such a critical time in its development,” and it is “easy to see why they view the Warriors as just that.” Their WNBA team will “use NBA-grade facilities.” Warriors President & COO Brandon Schneider said that the team has been “eager to see the league’s transformation in recent years,” as well as “the overall momentum with women’s sports.” Schneider said that the Warriors have “already had potential distribution partners reach out,” as well as companies currently partnered with the NBA team, who “want to be involved with their WNBA counterpart.” Philippou noted signs are “pointing in the right direction too in terms of ticket sales.” The team began accepting deposits for season tickets at 10am PT last Thursday and “received 2,000 deposits in the first five hours” (ESPN.com, 10/8).
SPREADING THE WEALTH: In S.F., Bruce Jenkins wrote he hopes Warriors owner Joe Lacob “schedules a few games in Oakland, Sacramento and San Jose, so as many fans as possible can enjoy the show.” Lacob “spares no expense for a satisfying conclusion,” and Jenkins wrote he does not think Lacob will “stand for a league with a cheapskate travel budget (teams mostly fly commercial during the regular season), a scattershot TV arrangement (only now do ESPN and ABC take over), and a salary structure far below what the players deserve.” Lacob and other rich owners, notably the Liberty’s Joseph Tsai and Aces’ Mark Davis, are “going to make sure this is a big-league operation in every way” (S.F. CHRONICLE, 10/7).
IN THE 6IX: THE ATHLETIC’s Eric Koreen reported Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment “declined to aggressively” pursue an expansion WNBA team. It was also reported that MLSE Chair Edward Rogers’ “poor relationship” with Raptors President Masai Ujiri “played a part in MLSE’s decision.” Rogers “seems a convenient scapegoat” for Toronto not getting a WNBA team. Koreen: “If everyone else on the board felt strongly enough about pursuing a WNBA team, MLSE would have done so.” Koreen wrote if MLSE “doesn’t see having a franchise as a valuable part of its sports portfolio,” then its thinking “seems short-sighted.” This city is “clearly ready” to support a WNBA team, and Koreen hopes that can “happen, with or without MLSE” (THE ATHLETIC, 10/7). In Toronto, Steve Simmons wrote the “story going around” that says that the WNBA “can’t expand to Toronto because there are not enough open dates at Scotiabank Arena.” Clearly, “somebody doesn’t want to pay” the $50M-plus expansion fees. The arena is “barely used” throughout the WNBA summer season (TORONTO SUN, 10/8).
SHARE THE SPOTLIGHT: In Chicago, Scoop Jackson wrote it’s time to “blame sports and the people who are in charge of making sure sports have become essential to our life’s existence” for the “lack of acknowledgment” of the WNBA Finals. The WNBA “still feels niche 30 seasons deep.” While the ratings will “more than likely prove different in the end,” it is the “cultural currency of the series that seems to be caught in the inescapable trap of America’s belittling psyche when it comes to women’s sports.” Jackson noted the “sub-minimal treatment played by” ESPN.com, FoxSports.com, and Yahoosports.com and “how they continue to play it.” Or how it is “treated across broadcast platforms.” ESPN, which is carrying the WNBA Finals, paid $27M in 2021 for WNBA TV rights, which included the All-Star Game and all postseason games. By 2025, the last year of the ESPN-WNBA deal, the “annual payout is set” at $33M. However, Jackson noted it comes with “very little front-forwarding presence on its biggest shows” (CHICAGO SUN-TIMES, 10/6).
PREPARE FOR TAKEOFF: In Boston, Gary Washburn noted the WNBA is “astute to prepare for its future.” In coming years, “maybe even next summer,” potential transcendent stars Iowa G Caitlin Clark, LSU F Angel Reese and UConn G Paige Bueckers will enter the draft and “give the league more allure.” The Golden State franchise “gives the WNBA 13 teams, so adding another club makes sense.” Portland, Toronto, and Philadelphia “have been interested.” Placing an expansion team in an NBA city “gives the WNBA the best possibility for success.” Warriors owner Joe Lacob said that the recent success of the WNBA and increased interest in a Bay Area team “encouraged their group to get involved.” Lacob said it is “finally the moment when we feel as an organization that we can do our best job to have a WNBA team in this building and in this market, and I also think that women’s basketball, women’s sports in general, is really starting to take a big upswing” (BOSTON GLOBE, 10/7).
PATIENTLY WAITED: THE ATHELTIC’s Marcus Thompson II wrote the WNBA announced it had “landed its Golden State goose.” This is what the league “wanted all along.” WNBA Commissioner Cathy Engelbert “waited patiently” for Lacob to “give the green light.” And then she “held firm until” Lacob agreed to pay the $50M expansion fee. This is “what the WNBA is getting, and what it desperately needs: the machine of the Warriors, which maximized their captivating superstars,” especially G Stephen Curry, along with the “passion and affluence of the area to historic levels.” The market and the machine “are why the league zeroed in on Golden State.” The league is growing and “still loaded with yet-tapped potential.” Thompson wrote it is “hard to argue” that the Warriors “aren’t the ideal partner to take the WNBA to a new level.” The trick “will be the balance of taking advantage of the Warriors’ established infrastructure” while also “giving the WNBA team its own operation.” Some stuff “will remain under one umbrella” — GSW Sports, LLC — such as finances. Especially early on, “while things are being established,” the Warriors “will lean on the incumbents.” But eventually, the “likelihood is they will have to find executive playmakers for the WNBA team, trained in the ways of Golden State” (THE ATHLETIC, 10/6).
In-Season vibe from Vegas; U.S. Soccer’s big moves; MLS’ championship weekend and people on the move.
As college football readies for the CFP and the NFL enters the final stage of its season, hosts Andrew Marchand and John Ourand look into the biggest media stories in both sports. For college football, that includes the CFP, the end of the Pac-12 conference and the final SEC on CBS telecast. With the NFL, Marchand and Ourand dissect the NFL’s decision to use flex scheduling on for “Monday Night Football,” and they analyze Amazon’s record-setting viewership for the Seahawks-Cowboys game.
Marchand and Ourand devote a topic to the NBA’s on-going media rights negotiations. Marchand looks into how MLB Network is treating MLB’s Winter Meetings. And Ourand explains why the DirecTV-Tegna carriage battle is so important to the sports media business.
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