Is the WNBA heading for a huge Caitlin Clark disaster?

The WNBA enjoyed one of their most successful seasons in 2024, and it was due in large part to the polarizing arrival of Caitlin Clark. Clark has quite literally changed the game for the league, but her immense stardom has brought along some unintended issues for the WNBA. They could escalate in the coming months and years to become serious problems.

There’s been an element of enviousness directed towards the Indiana Fever star by other WNBA players. They’ve noticed the attention she’s received from day one, without having accomplished all that much in the league relative to veterans.

NBA legend Charles Barkley said on The Bill Simmons Podcast in September 2024, “the number of eyeballs she’s brought to college and the pros, for these women to have this petty jealousness, you said it yourself, ‘damn what is going on here?’”

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NBA legend Shaquille O’Neal acknowledged there’s jealousy of Clark, but says that it comes with the territory. He told Bleacher Report, “There’s envious jealousy; there’s professional jealousy. Sure, there’s a lot of people who are professionally jealous. I am. I’m professionally jealous of a lot of people.”

While O’Neal’s comments are true to a certain extent, the fact that Clark received so much praise and credit for the WNBA’s transformation as a rookie has rubbed a lot of people the wrong way. Take A’ja Wilson, who is one of the most accomplished WNBA players of all time. She hinted at other motivations fueling Clark’s stardom.

Wilson told AP News during the 2024 season, “You can be top-notch at what you are as a Black woman, but they don’t see it as marketable, so it doesn’t matter how hard I work. It boils my blood when people say it’s not about race because it is.”

There’s been a consistent theme as well that a subset of people who support Clark also engage in racist language towards other players. Nancy Armour of USA Today begged Clark to call out the “toxic segment of her fan base” and denounce this behavior once and for all.

For her part, Clark said to Yahoo Sports in September 2024, “Nobody in our league should be facing any sort of racism, hurtful, disrespectful, hateful comments and threats. Those aren’t fans. Those are trolls.” With that said, the WNBA is going to have to continue to navigate jealousness within the league and uncouth behavior coming from the outside, and it’s not going away anytime soon.

Clark has brought a windfall of money to the WNBA. As ESPN reported in July 2024, the league was able to secure a new broadcast rights deal for 11 years, worth $2.2 billion. Without the gravitas Clark brought to the league, it’s hard to imagine the WNBA would’ve received a deal like this. However, with the increased prosperity also comes growing problems.

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Spotrac outlines Clark’s salary on her rookie scale contract. She made just over $76,000 in year one, will make just over $78,000 in year two, will make over $85,000 in year three, and will make over $97,000 in year four. That was already an issue, but the disparity becomes even more pronounced when you take into account Clark’s gargantuan stature and lucrative impact already.

According to Ryan Brewer, a professor at Indiana University Columbus, Clark was responsible for over 26 percent of the league’s revenue in 2024. Needless to say, that’s a stunning, if not surprising, figure. With that said, there may come a point in time where Clark and her fellow WNBA players will not accept the salaries they are currently making.

Erin Kane is Caitlin Clark’s agent, and she weighed in to ESPN on this topic in February 2024. She said, “Will Caitlin Clark ever be paid by the WNBA what she’s really worth to that league? I don’t think that’s possible.”

Kane continued, “She’s part of a larger player body. They all need to be paid more. She should be recognized for what she has done and what she’s brought to the league from an economic standpoint. It’s as simple as that.”

It’s a simple thing for Kane to say, but it’s a lot more complicated for the WNBA and the players association to figure out. The players association is going to want a boost in salary, but the question is how much? Are their expectations clouded by the stories that prove the WNBA is as successful as ever, and that they need to be made whole for that success?

As noted by Front Office Sports, WNBA players announced that they are opting out of their collective bargaining agreement that was supposed to run through 2027. That agreement now ends in October 2025, which means that the players and the league will have to navigate this issue sooner rather than later.

Many would say that this is a good problem for the league to have, but it’s still something that needs to be addressed and figured out. The Caitlin Clark effect has completely transformed the way the league does business, and her impact will be at the center of the discussion in the months to come.

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