Caitlin Clark’s WNBA Earnings Are Likely Lower Than You Think

Clark's undeniable television ratings during her 2024 Rookie of the Year campaign led to a national TV designation for 41 of Indiana's 44 regular season games this year, starting with the season opener against Angel Reese and the Chicago Sky on Saturday.

But when Forbes released its list of the 50 highest-paid athletes in the world on Thursday, Clark was nowhere to be found. 

The $76,535 salary in the first year of her rookie contract was the primary reason why Clark does not make as much money as you would think based on her status as one of the biggest stars in all of sports.

Unlike many of her WNBA colleagues, the 23-year-old opted out of playing for Unrivaled, a new 3-on-3 women's basketball league, this offseason. 

Unrivaled offered players like Reese and Sabrina Ionescu an average salary of more than $200,000 for just 14 games. For comparison, Clark's Fever teammate Kelsey Mitchell has the largest salary in the WNBA at $249,244 for the entire season.

Clark's off-court success is what kept her No. 1 among all women's basketball players in total earnings in 2024. Her reported eight-year, $28 million contract with Nike is worth more than 40 times her WNBA salary alone.

Unfortunately, even the highest-paid female athlete in 2024 (tennis star Coco Gauff, $34.4 million) would not sniff the top 50 athletes overall because of the massive gap in salaries and revenues. 

There is still a long way to go for the incomes of the most popular female athletes to more fairly represent their huge appeal to sports fans.