- WNBA star Caitlin Clark’s rookie card just sold for $660,000 at auction—over 8.5 times her annual salary of $76,000, and the most money ever made at a public auction for a woman athlete. Despite the women’s league pulling in more viewership than men’s games and landing billion-dollar expansion deals, players are still earning a fraction of their male counterparts. Poor pay has forced WNBA stars to make ends meet with NIL deals and side-hustles like TV commentating and restaurant ownership.
From eclipsing men’s viewership to selling out Nike collabs in minutes, the WNBA’s momentum is undeniable. Now Caitlin Clark’s memorabilia is shattering auction records—pulling in sums that dwarf her annual salary.
Clark’s Rookie Royalty WNBA Flawless Logowoman card, a piece of memorabilia which is one-of-one, sold for a whopping $660,000 last Thursday night.
It’s a rare find for collectors, as the card is signed and inscribed with Clark’s scoring total for her rookie season on the Indiana Fever, and also includes a Logowoman patch adorned on WNBA jerseys.
The card started at an extended bidding price of $336,0000—the previous sale price of Clark’s 2024 Panini Prizm WNBA Signatures Gold Vinyl 1/1 PSA 10 back in March. But when it sold for nearly double that, the collector’s item made history for the most money made at a public auction for a woman athlete—and it’s a far cry from what the superstar makes in one year.
In fact, Clark makes less than the average New Yorker; despite being the number one draft pick in the WNBA last year, she only earned a salary of $76,535 for her first year on the Indiana Fever. That’s a rock-bottom wage for the phenom of women’s basketball, as her card that fetched hundreds of thousands at auction is over 8.6 times higher than her annual pay. Even Clark’s four-year contract, in which she’ll make a total of $338,000, is just about half of the card’s value.
WNBA wages have failed to keep pace with its surging popularity; last year, the women’s NCAA March Madness tournament final had 18.7 million viewers tuning in, compared to 14.82 million watching the men’s last game. Yet the first pick of the NBA season was expected to make $10.5 million—137 times more than what Clark makes in a year.
‘Pay us what you owe us’: WNBA players leaning on NIL deals and side-hustles to make ends meet
Clark is one of the biggest names in U.S. sports, with fellow stars Cameron Brink, Rickea Jackson, and Angel Reese helping shatter records for the league. But their pay is in stark contrast to their cultural and business impact.
In 2023, the average WNBA player made a base of $113,295 per year, compared to the typical NBA hooper making around $9.7 million. Women’s low pay in the league has been a hot topic of discussion; about 40 players recently met with the WNBA to negotiate their compensation, but failed to reach a new collective bargaining agreement (CBA). The basketball stars had opted out of their last CBA in October 2024, and had hoped to broker a better revenue-sharing model, higher salaries, cushier benefits, and a more lenient salary cap.
But negotiations fell through, prompting Clark and other WNBA players to wear “Pay us what you owe us” t-shirts ahead of their All-Star game on Saturday last week. The sold-out arena of over 16,000 attendees, and millions of viewers tuning in at home, watched the stars push back against a long-held issue. Right now, WNBA hoopers receive 9.3% of their league’s revenue—in comparison, NBA players reap between 49% and 51% of the league’s basketball-related income.
“This is no laughing matter. This is no trend, this is no moment in time,” A’ja Wilson, a Las Vegas Aces player and three-time league MVP, told NPR. “You’re dealing with me, my livelihood, my future, the next generation. So we’re going to take this very, very seriously.”
Fortune has contacted WNBA for comment.
WNBA players make their millions in side hustles instead
Although the WNBA recently signed a $2.2 billion media deal with expansion fees of $250 million, the female athletes aren’t raking in millions from the sport itself. Instead, many women’s basketball stars are getting creative in the ways they supplement their income.
One popular way is through name, image, and likeness (NIL) deals—Clark made $3.1 million from NIL agreements in 2023, in the final year of her college stint.
There’s also the option to play overseas; Olympian Brittney Griner made four times her WNBA salary in Russia, earning more than $1 million.
Others without million-dollar brand deals have to resort to juggling part-time jobs. Chiney Ogwumike, who played for the Los Angeles Sparks, has since become a basketball analyst and host for ESPN; Haley Jones, a guard for the Dallas Wings, has also commentated for NBA TV and the WNBA finals. And the Atlanta Dream’s Allisha Gray has a side-hustle dishing out wings and burgers as the owner of WNB Factory restaurant.
