LC
Years ago

WNBL minimum pay rise: is it a double-edged sword?

I am all for the WNBL players getting a pay rise - heck they deserve it as some of the best players in the world. They deserve much more in fact.

From a skill, talent and ability perspective, it is arguably the best and most competitive national league in the country.

However there is one area that bugs me...how can the league and the teams afford it? Where has the extra money come from?

Adelaide went close to folding, as did Dandenong within the past few months. I'd hate to see the additional cost burden drive a team or two out of business.

WNBL players welcome minimum pay increase, but is it a double-edged sword?

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Luuuc
Years ago

Double edged swords are great. Why not be able to kill an enemy on the backswing as well?
Imagine being in grave danger, rushing over to grab your sword and taking a quick swing at your attacker before they strike, only to realise with dread that in your haste you picked up your single-edged sword the wrong way around, hit them with the blunt edge, and now you've got a knife in your throat. Major bummer, right?
Double edged swords FTW.

And while I have zero sympathy for the Lightning in this particular instance since their spending on minimum wage players was absolutely dwarfed (or should that now be little-peopled) by their spending on WNBA imports and star aussies, I do worry about teams at the other end of the scale - the ones who spend within their means and don't have big budget rosters, such as Bendigo. Their salary bill just went up by probably $16-$22k with nothing to show for the increase in terms of better talent. So either they come up with that extra money just to tread water, or else they're forced to make savings elsewhere on roster by means of maybe a cheaper import, or perhaps being unable to retain a quality local player and having to get someone inferior in their place.

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Anonymous
Years ago

They will simply fill their rosters with more "development" players as they don't put an age restriction on that area, they also don’t have to pay all ten players , so they will either pay less to their older big name players to put the younger up and coming ones on the pay roll as teams do now , or they will use their “development p,ayers” it’s all in the wording of that contract

Plus add that more teams are looking to align with bigger backers it will /could work for the clubs, but not necessarily for the betterment of the league.

Women’s netball have really only just the last few years been paid a half decent amount and a lot of that came from lobbying to get support behind the scenes, time the WNBL looked at the bigger picture instead of bandaid fixes.
Cricket and AWFL have huge backing and will continue to grow, so too soccer, but women’s basketball is left floundering
No promotion unless it’s on one or two players, never clubs, which the football promote “teams” even this new NBL1 league is already male dominated , first preview 90% of the segment was about the men’s teams, the women were thrown in as a “heck better say something quick then we can get back to basketball” ......until that type of thing changes women’s basketball will always struggle sadly
Your prime example of how self promoting on a bigger scale works is Melbourne Boomers. But you don’t see any of the other teams doing what they do, imagine if that kind of promotion was done on a league scale.

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WNBL minimum pay rise: is it a double-edged sword?

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