Recently, there was news in the sports world that American basketball star Britney Glena was arrested in Russia for finding cannabis oil in her luggage.
When the US media reported the news, they asked a question, why did Greener go to Russia?
Because she played there, she played for Yekaterinburg in the Russian Women's Basketball League in the offseason of the WNBA, winning 3 league titles and 4 Europa League gold medals.
Glena was the WNBA's 2013 draft pick, won one championship in the WNBA, was named an All-Star seven times, was a 2-time scoring champion, 8 block kings, 6 all-team (first or second team), seven all-defensive team (first or second team), two best defensive player awards, and was one of the 25 superstars of the WNBA's 25th anniversary.
Why would a player of this caliber, a proper WNBA superstar, a player of this level, go to Russia in the offseason?
Because of the lack of money!
Not only did Glena play in Russia, she also played for China's WCBA Zhejiang team after her rookie season, when she was offered a four-month, $600,000 contract. When the contract was placed in front of Glena, she was thrilled.
"That's 12 times my salary for a rookie season in the WNBA!" Greener said.
$600,000 makes a WNBA show so excited? Also in 2013, the NBA's Bennett rookie annual salary was 5.32 million, although his NBA career was quite watery, but he also had a salary of 16 million, which is enough to make any WNBA superstar envious.
The WNBA is only one letter apart from the NBA shorthand, but the salary is very different. The average salary of an NBA player is 8.32 million, the WNBA is 75,000, and the NBA is 110 times that of the WNBA!
The WNBA's highest salary this season is Diana Taurasi, with a salary of $228,000, and the first highest salary in the NBA this season is Curry, the number is 45.78 million, a difference of 200 times. As far as Taurusi's salary is concerned, Curry earned half-time.
For example, the average income of male golfers in the United States is 25 times that of women, and the average salary of men's soccer leagues is 12 times that of women's leagues, although it is not as exaggerated as between the NBA and the WNBA, but the gap is also more than 10 times.
This applies to the global sports world, except for individual sports such as tennis and gymnastics, where the income of female athletes is unattainable compared to that of male athletes, and the more marketable it is, the more so. The world's highest-paid women's football player is Hegberg, who plays for Lyon, France, with an annual salary of 400,000 euros, which is less than a week earned by Messi and Ronaldo.
Not long ago, the Chinese women's football team staged a stunning reversal in the final of the Asian Cup to kill the South Korean team and was crowned the Asian champion again. After the women's football team won the championship, there were two loudest calls, one is that the sonorous roses earn too little, and the other is that the men's football team earns too much.
Many people in the industry have made popular science, the investment in the Chinese women's football league is the first in the world, and the income of women's football players is also in the forefront of the world. However, this "first" and "forefront" are placed in the category of women's football, if compared with men's football, placed in world football, that is, your top salary is not enough for other people's weekly salary.
The immediate reason for such a large income gap is the source of income. Professional sports leagues, income comes from tickets, broadcasts, sponsorships, etc., and being able to leverage these incomes is attention, to put it bluntly, how many people watch.
In terms of the World Cup with the most market value for men's and women's football, the 2019 Women's World Cup, the number of global spectators is close to 1 billion, this number is questioned mixed with water, but even if it is really 1 billion, in front of the men's football team is not enough to play, just a year ago in the 2018 Men's World Cup, the number of global spectators is close to 3.6 billion, 2.6 billion the number of people, bringing the men's World Cup only one of the average broadcast fees is 10 times that of the women's football team.
Specific to the Chinese men's and women's football team, the cumulative number of viewers of the men's super league in 2020 exceeded 2 billion, while the number of women's football leagues was 10.21 million. The huge difference in the degree of attention has led to a judgment of market value.
"On matchday, there were estimated to be only a dozen fans on the scene, less than the number of people playing on the field." Women's football player Zhao Lina admitted frankly.
Professional sports are real and cruel, WNBA stars have repeatedly publicly complained that the salary is too low, they believe that this is mainly because of the unreasonable labor agreement, the NBA labor and management sides are basically basketball income five and five points, while the WNBA is two eight, the players only take about 20%.
However, the WNBA capital also has something to say, the NBA and the WNBA in addition to playing basketball, there is almost no commonality in the market field, NBA 75 years of history, WNBA is only 25 years, the difference of 50 years, in the commercial development of more than half a century. The average attendance in the NBA is more than 17,000, while the WNBA is only 6,500. The NBA averaged 2 million viewers per game, and the WNBA was less than 250,000. The NBA's annual revenue is $8 billion, the WNBA is only 60 million, Wall and Westbrook have a combined salary of 88 million this season, and the annual income of the WNBA is not enough to pay the salaries of these two.
The WNBA has been in a state of losing money, losing $10 million a year, and the alliance has not had an economic crisis, relying on the NBA 'blood transfusion', which subsidizes the WNBA every year.
The WNBA's season is set to take place from July to October, which is the offseason of the NBA, and the WNBA could theoretically fill in the gaps, but in fact basketball fans are more inclined to choose "vacation" at this stage than to go to women's basketball games.
The gap between the NBA and the WNBA is the concentrated embodiment of the difference between men's and women's sports in the market, there are historical reasons for this situation, many countries started late in women's sports, but this is not a fundamental factor, the difference in ornamentation is the root cause, even if the Chinese women's football team is on the top of Asia, the United States women's basketball team has won the Olympic gold medal for 7 consecutive times, the vast majority of sports fans like to watch the men's football team, or the NBA, because the ornamentation is stronger.
Ornamentality, attention, economic benefits, this is a link of professional sports, like football and basketball these projects, men and women from the first link to open the distance, the follow-up will only be more and more large, it is difficult to catch up.
The WNBA's first high-paid Tao Lexi mentioned above is known as Jordan of the WNBA in the industry, but even in the category of basketball fans, how many people know her? Jordan of the WNBA is still like this, not to mention other players.
Many countries have taken measures to support the development of women's sports, And China has played a positive role in demonstrating that the league has invested high incomes in big athletes, which is why many outstanding foreign female athletes have come to China to compete.
In addition to the support at the national level, there is also the operation of the league, the more common way is that the men's team should be paired with the women's team, such as the European Football League, the club should have two teams of men and women, playing in the men's and women's leagues, the purpose of this is to use the men's team to drive the flow of the women's team, and it has indeed received some effects.
However, no matter what kind of way, it can only bring about a slight improvement in the stage, and there is still a long way to go to fundamentally solve the problem of unpaid male and female athletes, and it is very difficult, because the matter of ornamentality is not completely solved by verbal or keyboard "support".
As the women's football star Wang Shuang said, when women's football is no longer a tool to satirize men's football, no longer only the national team gets support, and the league can also get attention, it is more meaningful.