Caitlin Clark is one of the biggest names in the world of sports today — but it's now become pretty common knowledge that her WNBA contract is chump change.
The first overall pick of the 2024 WNBA Draft received a four-year, $338,000 deal with the Indiana Fever, which will pay her about $76,535 in her first year.
That number is in the ballpark of what the average American gets paid in a year — but Clark is obviously bringing in much more for the league. She's coming off of an NCAA Women's Championship Game that pulled nearly 19 million viewers and beat out the viewership of the Men's game.
And with the NCAA allowing players to profit off their name, image, and likeness (NIL), some are arguing that Clark is giving up a ton of money by going pro. Others defending Clark's decision say that it's untrue that women's basketball players make less in the pros.
But what are the arguments of both sides exactly?
Related: WNBA ticket prices already showcasing Caitlin Clark's massive pull
The argument for staying in college
NCAA athletes have been able to earn a living ever since the NIL rules were changed on July 1, 2021.
While the number that athletes earn differs for a variety of reasons, — including sport, skill, and program — the best and most popular athletes are clearly raking in millions. One prominent example is likely former USC quarterback and the likely No. 1 overall pick in this Thursday's NFL Draft Caleb Williams, who infamously lives in a penthouse apartment in Los Angeles.
College sports-focused website On3 has created projections for the NIL valuation of athletes, and before Clark had declared for the WNBA Draft, she was projected at north of $3 million annually.
And this is merely a projection.
Clark, who had a year left of eligibility in the WNBA, could take several approaches to earn more considering the unprecedented following she has gained over the last year.
She could have received a ton of money from NIL collectives — school-specific groups that provide funds to institutions and tend to consist of alumni and fans. This sum could've served similarly to a contract.
While Clark has been loyal to Iowa, the option to transfer to another school that could have had a larger offer could have possibly been on the table.
Clark's star power could have also given her more endorsements — and some are arguing that the NCAA has a bigger, more proven stage in terms of viewership than the WNBA for Clark to pitch to brands.
She recently signed an eight-figure deal with Nike, and longtime sports business journalist Darren Rovell, one of the strongest advocates for Clark making more money in college, said that she could have received the same deal at Iowa.
Say it with me now.
— Darren Rovell (@darrenrovell) April 18, 2024
Nike would have given her the same deal at Iowa!
Do we not get it yet? https://t.co/Pom3xgYikk
The argument for going pro
Clark's salary for the 2024 WNBA season will be less than six figures. That isn't changing.
But Howard Megdal, the esteemed women's basketball journalist and founder of The Next, wrote on Forbes last week that there is a world where Clark's contract could change drastically as early as 2026.
The contracts of WNBA players are based off a collective bargaining agreement, but the league's Players Association can opt out of that deal as early as Oct. 31, 2025. If the WNBA's trajectory mirrors the NCAA Women's Game — or even the record-high viewership of the 2024 WNBA Draft — it would be a no-brainer for the players to opt out.
That could change the revenue split for the players, essentially allowing them a larger chunk of the pie. And Megdal said that the agreement could include ripping away at rookie contracts entirely and changing them to the adjusted number.
The argument against this would be that Clark would still receive the low salary for a few years, but the counter to that argument is one that professional athletes across all sports have made for years to justify going pro earlier.
That is that the earlier you go pro, the sooner you can get to your second contract. That contract tends to be the biggest one — and in the new WNBA CBA, it could trounce NIL numbers.
That, of course, is no certainty given that the revenue split the players will get from the WNBA is unclear, and Clark will still need to prove herself in the league to guarantee a maximum level deal.
But if there is a world that the WNBA could even approach a 50-50 revenue split, which is what the NBA Players Association was able to secure with the NBA, that number could be well over nine-figures annually for players.
This was illustrated by Southern Utah University economics professor David Berri, who showed that someone like Connecticut Sun's Alyssa Thomas could be making over $3.5 million right now if that split were conducted.
I have now done four interviews (with Vox, CNN, USA Today, and NBC) about Caitlin Clark's very low WNBA salary.
— David Berri (@wagesofwins) April 17, 2024
This is a table from Slaying the Trolls!! (a forthcoming book I wrote with the amazing @NefWalker).
The WNBA has the money to pay its top players millions! pic.twitter.com/78HXsu87X9
The current rule in the WNBA is that revenue sharing would only be done if certain thresholds were met, but those have not been reached so far, according to a report by CNBC.
Related: Caitlin Clark and Angel Reese NIL value tops women's college basketball
As for the argument about Clark — or any WNBA player's — endorsement deals in the NCAA and WNBA, there are several points to be made for going pro.
The first is that signature shoes are primarily given to professional athletes, so Clark staying in college may have not guaranteed the same deal right away from a brand like Nike.
WNBA Commissioner Cathy Englebert also argued that the WNBA will allow Clark a more global reach, which the NCAA does not have. This is the same reasoning for NBA players, as NBA Finals games do not actually pull the same viewership as the NCAA Men's National Championship, but create a much bigger buzz nationally.
So who is right?
There is no definitive answer — and there may not be one.
Recent WNBA players who experienced NIL like the Atlanta Dream's Haley Jones have said that she hasn't felt a pay cut since going pro, and Deloitte's Principal for Global and US Sports Pete Giorgio told TheStreet that he believes Clark will be more successful in the WNBA in any form of measurement.
But Clark is a different phenomenon — maybe even in all of sports history — and there's no world to also see the path to Clark's earnings if she decided to stay in college, so that will really just be a sunk cost, if at all.
