IN DEFENSE OF | THE WNBA PLAYERS

The WNBA players are not backing down. The players want more money, and the league is refusing to budge. That said, their demands are not unreasonable. Yes, the quality of play does not compare to the NBA, but that comparison is part of the problem.

Why does the WNBA always have to be measured against the NBA in the first place?

Some commentators and YouTubers like to frame the WNBA as a team-driven league. That is technically true, because no league survives without teams. However, basketball is still a star-driven sport. You need larger-than-life players to get people into seats and to keep casual fans invested.

This is where I can draw a parallel with the PBA. The league is clearly divided between the SMC and MVP teams and everyone else. Most of the strongest fanbases belong to the big-market squads, with maybe Meralco and NLEX as partial exceptions. Fans of the other teams often rally behind Rain or Shine, Converge, or whichever squad is overachieving enough to challenge the power teams. San Miguel, Ginebra, Magnolia, and TNT are championship-focused teams with deep and loyal fanbases. For the rest of the league, the situation is the opposite.

Right now, a typical PBA team plays around 11 elimination-round games, which gives a semifinal team roughly 35 games a year. That number drops even further for teams that spend most of the season as punching bags, such as Blackwater, Terrafirma, and even Phoenix after the departure of Matthew Wright. I understand why the PBA prefers best-of-seven semifinals. The league draws its biggest crowds when the top teams collide. The downside is that this setup hurts the weaker teams.

Less exposure means fewer fans, and fewer fans mean long-term irrelevance.

I was actually hoping the Philippine Cup would adopt a double round-robin elimination format, especially given the long gap between the 2025–26 PBA season and 2027. Extended inactivity only makes it easier for fans to forget these teams altogether.

The problem becomes even more serious when you look at the NBA–WNBA partnership. The NBA plays an 82-game regular season, while the WNBA plays 44. A championship run can push that total to somewhere between 44 and 59 games. Unlike the PBA, the WNBA is restricted to a narrow window between the end of the NBA season and the start of the next one. This forces many WNBA players to find other jobs between May and October.

For some players, higher WNBA salaries would remove the need to play overseas. That does not mean they should be barred from doing so. Playing in Europe hurts visibility, but it also allows players to earn anywhere between 50,000 and 110,000 US dollars, depending on their profile. It also gives them the chance to keep playing, travel, and improve their game.

Then there is Unrivaled, the new three-on-three full-court women’s league that offers better pay and a more modern presentation.

In many ways, this is the kind of approach the WNBA should have embraced from the beginning.

This leads to another long-standing issue: the way the WNBA handled its early drafts. During its inaugural season, the league used three methods to distribute players. There was the allocation draft, the elite draft for top players from other professional leagues, and the traditional draft for college graduates. If it were up to me, the league should have continued territorial picks for at least the next ten drafts.

It may sound unfair, but basketball fandom is often regional. Many players already have built-in fanbases because of the colleges they played for. Imagine how easy it would have been to build support if a UConn legend like Sue Bird had played for the Connecticut Sun, or if Tennessee’s Candace Parker had landed with a team that's near her college, like the Atlanta Dream or a Tennessee-based squad, if there was one.

In today’s landscape, every team deserves a generational talent like Caitlin Clark. But after the era of Lisa Leslie, many teams struggled to grow their audience because the league lacked players who could truly electrify the game.

This is not an attack on the players’ skill. It is simply a reality when you compare the WNBA to the NBA. There are no constant, highlight-reel dunkers. There were stretches when the league lacked magnetic figures like Caitlin Clark or Angel Reese. Love her or hate her, Reese’s rivalries and personality add drama, and drama makes the league must-watch.

If the WNBA truly wants the NBA treatment, it might also need to rethink its branding. Many teams feel like female versions of NBA franchises, right down to the logos. I understand that most NBA teams own their WNBA counterparts, but maybe differentiation is the answer. Instead of the New York Liberty, why not something like Empire State Liberty? Instead of the Los Angeles Sparks, maybe the California Sparks. Small changes like this could help the league feel less like a copy and more like its own entity.

Expansion could help too, especially in women’s basketball hotbeds. Teams like the Connecticut Sun, Seattle Storm, and Las Vegas Aces already thrive outside the traditional NBA city mold. The Golden State Valkyries are heading into their second year, with the Portland Fire and Toronto Tempo set to debut this season. Philadelphia will join in 2027, and Cleveland and Detroit are expected to return as well.

All of this is why I side with the WNBA players. The league is constantly viewed as the NBA’s baby sister. People either label the players as entitled or pity them as an inferior product.

This is a make-or-break moment.

Settling for whatever the NBA offers is not a serious path forward.

Better contracts mean players can be financially stable, whether or not they choose to play overseas in the offseason. And if they do go abroad, it should be by choice, whether for money, skill development, or simply the experience of playing the game in different parts of the world.

The league also needs to rethink its presentation. I like what Unrivaled has done visually, and I would not mind seeing elements of that in the WNBA. Even small things, like placing player names above the jersey numbers instead of below, can improve visibility and branding.

To be clear, this is not about being “woke.” I dislike how some franchises push female empowerment without substance and then complain when audiences do not respond. I also dislike how the WNBA players constantly compares itself to the NBA, because that is the fastest way to undermine their own credibility.

If anything, the league should study the WWE model. Many female wrestlers are just as compelling, if not more so, than their male counterparts because they built distinct characters instead of watered-down versions of men. That is the blueprint the WNBA needs to follow.

The NBA has helped the WNBA survive, but that association is also why the league is often treated as secondary. The NCAA proves that women’s basketball can draw massive audiences when presented properly. People can say the players should just accept the current terms, but if the WNBA truly wants to stand on its own, bold steps are necessary.

If that means risking a season to secure a better future, then so be it.