Jill Ellis leaving USWNT

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Club owners are businessmen. They will invest more when they see a bigger opportunity. Other than the Thorns no NWSL club averages more than maybe 7500 per game. For all the interest in the WNT and WC it isn't translating to regular butts in the seats or TV deals (Lifetime dropped the league after one year.

Businessmen know you’ve got to spend money to make money. They build a brand over time losing money upfront to make more later. NWSL owners are more opportunists than businessmen because they don’t invest and then require USSF subsidies to protect them from losses. Look at your average MLS club where attendance is about 3-4x higher than NWSL but they are spending 10-15x the gate for promotion, multi-million salaries, and facilities. They are building their brand and their sport just like NHL and NBA owners did 50-70 years ago when pro hockey and basketball were young, unfollowed sports. They didn’t go looking for handouts and immediate profits like most NWSL owners.

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they are wrong. your numbers refer to an NWSL player. Not an allocated WNT player

No, the numbers are right. You just don’t understand how it works (or it doesn’t fit the narrative you want to believe/tell). That maximum $46k salary is what the allocated USWNT make from playing in NWSL, but technically USSF is paying for it. It can be higher with bonuses for making certain performance metrics or playoffs, finals, etc., but it isn’t not huge given the max cap. The pay they get for playing on the national team is a whole separate thing and there is where the apples to apples comparisons with USMNT come in. For playing a national team game they make far less than the men and when they win (and obviously they’ve won way more than the men), they earn far less than the men could have for the same win. So it’s really a double whammy because NWSL controls their pay/career whether they are playing internationally or not. A USMNT member playing in MLS is getting paid by the club, not USSF so he can decide to play on the national team or not. USWNT doesn’t have that luxury because USSF is paying for both, but USSF underpays them because they have that control over whether they get to play soccer at all. It’s a broken system and unfair.

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Businessmen know you’ve got to spend money to make money. They build a brand over time losing money upfront to make more later. NWSL owners are more opportunists than businessmen because they don’t invest and then require USSF subsidies to protect them from losses. Look at your average MLS club where attendance is about 3-4x higher than NWSL but they are spending 10-15x the gate for promotion, multi-million salaries, and facilities. They are building their brand and their sport just like NHL and NBA owners did 50-70 years ago when pro hockey and basketball were young, unfollowed sports. They didn’t go looking for handouts and immediate profits like most NWSL owners.

Different times, different risks, less popular sport and a female one at that.

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Different times, different risks, less popular sport and a female one at that.

Pretty sure no one was making a ton of money 50-70 years ago in sports. That was even before baseball Free Agency. They just screwed the player as hard as they could.

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Pretty sure no one was making a ton of money 50-70 years ago in sports. That was even before baseball Free Agency. They just screwed the player as hard as they could.

Oh I misread the whole thing, scratch this

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Soccer is the MOST popular sport in the world.

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Soccer is the MOST popular sport in the world.

It's a distant 4th at best in the US, and that's for men's soccer. The WNBA has been around since 1996 and attendance and revenues are still poor and basketball is far more popular. Investors are much more short term focused than they were 50 years ago. Everyone wants to make a quick buck. They're not looking for a 20+ year pay out.

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Soccer is the MOST popular sport in the world.

MENS soccer is. Women’s soccer is an afterthought. Not even that popular in the USA.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/...or-girls-2010/

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Agreed that USSF is propping up NWSL, but it also works to USSF’s and team owner’s advantage a lot more than it does the players and absolutely hurts women’s soccer. Non-allocated (meaning non-USWNT) minimum pay in NWSL is $15k/yr and the majority of players are making close to that. Allocated players make a minimum NWSL salary of $46k although stars like Morgan make more through bonuses and private endorsements. Still a very top player like Morgan is probably earning $500k in an average year, which is chicken feed in the pro sports world for top talent. For very little salary/bonus money, USSF gets control of their careers whether they are in a club or national team jersey. Team owners get cheap talent and don’t need to pay for their top talent (USWNT members) so they don’t invest heavily in their teams. And whenever you or I hear about how little women’s soccer players are paid, another young talent coming up in HS or college hears that too and decides not to go pro and the sport suffers. Nothing move forward because USSF repeatedly fails to meaningfully invest in the women’s side of the sport. The message is always the men must move first and then they’ll invest in the women, but the simple fact is that the women have been stronger for decades and they’ve squandered the money on the men’s side.

The USSF showed they poured more into the WNT from 2010-2018. The question is should they do even more? The USSF can’t make Women’s soccer happen on the World Stage by itself. The US WNT needs to lose the equal pay nonsense. Very whiney and BS. Apples and oranges. They need the USSF to invest more. Problem is European Club Teams are doing that in Europe. No way the US and MLS can touch that.

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Does this sound familiar? The WNBA was founded over 20 years ago, gets a ton of support from the NBA, yet it can't make money or get much traction going with a much more popular sport than soccer.


WNBA players are poorly paid https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidbe.../#1f5af0fa33eb

"In the past few weeks, a collection of WNBA stars have spoken out about pay in the WNBA. An incomplete list would include Liz Cambage, Kelsey Plum, Skyler Diggins-Smith, A'ja Wilson, Seimone Augustus, Kia Nurse, and ******** Griner. According to High Post Hoops, none of these players are paid more than $115,500 by the WNBA. Meanwhile, according to ESPN, the eight lowest paid players in the NBA in 2018-19 will be paid $838,464. And none of these players have even played in the NBA yet." Despite this disparity, the WNBA players are not being asked to be paid the same amount as an NBA player. What WNBA players keep emphasizing is that they want the WNBA to change the way the WNBA revenues are shared with its players."


The WNBA has lost an average of $10M a year since it started and average game attendance is declining https://www.usatoday.com/story/sport...2019/38809289/

The WNBA has less viewers than bowling https://thefederalist.com/2018/07/11...eyre-overpaid/

"Of course the real issue has nothing to do with sexism and everything to do with the fact that the WNBA simply isn’t very popular with Americans. For example, last month the WNBA averaged 250,000 viewers per game with a high of 378,000. Relative to the history of the league, this was an extraordinary success, up 39 percent from last year. By comparison, last year’s Professional Bowling League averaged 650,000 viewers for ESPN."

[Unregistered]

Does this sound familiar? The WNBA was founded over 20 years ago, gets a ton of support from the NBA, yet it can't make money or get much traction going with a much more popular sport than soccer.


WNBA players are poorly paid https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidbe.../#1f5af0fa33eb

"In the past few weeks, a collection of WNBA stars have spoken out about pay in the WNBA. An incomplete list would include Liz Cambage, Kelsey Plum, Skyler Diggins-Smith, A'ja Wilson, Seimone Augustus, Kia Nurse, and ******** Griner. According to High Post Hoops, none of these players are paid more than $115,500 by the WNBA. Meanwhile, according to ESPN, the eight lowest paid players in the NBA in 2018-19 will be paid $838,464. And none of these players have even played in the NBA yet." Despite this disparity, the WNBA players are not being asked to be paid the same amount as an NBA player. What WNBA players keep emphasizing is that they want the WNBA to change the way the WNBA revenues are shared with its players."


The WNBA has lost an average of $10M a year since it started and average game attendance is declining https://www.usatoday.com/story/sport...2019/38809289/

The WNBA has less viewers than bowling https://thefederalist.com/2018/07/11...eyre-overpaid/

"Of course the real issue has nothing to do with sexism and everything to do with the fact that the WNBA simply isn’t very popular with Americans. For example, last month the WNBA averaged 250,000 viewers per game with a high of 378,000. Relative to the history of the league, this was an extraordinary success, up 39 percent from last year. By comparison, last year’s Professional Bowling League averaged 650,000 viewers for ESPN."

WNBA, NWSL, Pro Bowling....

Right up there with watching paint dry.😉

[Unregistered]

Does this sound familiar? The WNBA was founded over 20 years ago, gets a ton of support from the NBA, yet it can't make money or get much traction going with a much more popular sport than soccer.


WNBA players are poorly paid https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidbe.../#1f5af0fa33eb

"In the past few weeks, a collection of WNBA stars have spoken out about pay in the WNBA. An incomplete list would include Liz Cambage, Kelsey Plum, Skyler Diggins-Smith, A'ja Wilson, Seimone Augustus, Kia Nurse, and ******** Griner. According to High Post Hoops, none of these players are paid more than $115,500 by the WNBA. Meanwhile, according to ESPN, the eight lowest paid players in the NBA in 2018-19 will be paid $838,464. And none of these players have even played in the NBA yet." Despite this disparity, the WNBA players are not being asked to be paid the same amount as an NBA player. What WNBA players keep emphasizing is that they want the WNBA to change the way the WNBA revenues are shared with its players."


The WNBA has lost an average of $10M a year since it started and average game attendance is declining https://www.usatoday.com/story/sport...2019/38809289/

The WNBA has less viewers than bowling https://thefederalist.com/2018/07/11...eyre-overpaid/

"Of course the real issue has nothing to do with sexism and everything to do with the fact that the WNBA simply isn’t very popular with Americans. For example, last month the WNBA averaged 250,000 viewers per game with a high of 378,000. Relative to the history of the league, this was an extraordinary success, up 39 percent from last year. By comparison, last year’s Professional Bowling League averaged 650,000 viewers for ESPN."

Until the sports are completely funded for and controlled by the government (which will hopefully never happen), you either have a successful business or not. If your business is a big time success then everyone makes more money. If it isn't then you make less money. I really wonder if the average american is so sympathetic to people who play games and make more than 100,000 per year doing it.

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[QUOTE=Unregistered;2538785]Until the sports are completely funded for and controlled by the government (which will hopefully never happen), you either have a successful business or not. If your business is a big time success then everyone makes more money. If it isn't then you make less money. I really wonder if the average american is so sympathetic to people who play games and make more than 100,000 per year doing it.......and if any of the athletes are not ecstatic with what they are doing and making then they have the option to find real jobs anywhere they can find one.

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Until the sports are completely funded for and controlled by the government (which will hopefully never happen), you either have a successful business or not. If your business is a big time success then everyone makes more money. If it isn't then you make less money. I really wonder if the average american is so sympathetic to people who play games and make more than 100,000 per year doing it.

But they will shell out $100 or more per ticket to watch athletes who make $20M a year. Or they'll make a point of catching their home teams games on TV. Why? It - the big US sports - entertains them. In the US soccer to many isn't entertaining, or at least not entertaining enough to spend much of their limited time and funds.

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But they will shell out $100 or more per ticket to watch athletes who make $20M a year. Or they'll make a point of catching their home teams games on TV. Why? It - the big US sports - entertains them. In the US soccer to many isn't entertaining, or at least not entertaining enough to spend much of their limited time and funds.

People don’t bat at eye anymore at the amount athletes earn. I don’t blame them for earning as much as they can in their short careers. Better than it all going to the team owners who are still making out like bandits in big pro sports. Clearly enough to go around. My take on soccer is that it is growing in popularity whereas the better known ones like football and baseball might actually be one the decline if you go by attendance and team revenues. I remember going to Revs games 10+ years ago where the attendance was 10-12k and now it’s 19-20k for many games. I think millennials and certainly the Latino population that is growing will only make it more popular. I’ll go out on a limb and say maybe in 20-30 years it will be as or more popular than football or baseball.