With WNBA expansion adding roster spots, it's time to drop the age restriction

New York Times

11 hours ago

Over the next five years, the WNBA will bring five new teams into the league, and with them, at least 60 new roster spots. The league — long touted as the 'toughest to make' in pro sports — is likely about to get less tough to break into as general managers scour the globe to find these players to fit their rosters.
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New GMs in Toronto, Portland, Cleveland, Detroit and Philadelphia might follow the lead of the Golden State Valkyries, who started play this season as the WNBA's first expansion team since 2008. Golden State GM Ohemaa Nyanin took an international approach and filled out her roster with mostly WNBA reserves from the expansion draft and international talent. The result? The Valkyries have overachieved by all standards and could become the first WNBA expansion team to make the playoffs in its first season.
Other new GMs might tap vets who've been out of the league for a year or two or under-the-radar players who've toiled overseas — players such as Rebekkah Gardner, who went undrafted in 2012 but made her first WNBA roster in 2022, at 31, and is averaging 15 minutes a game for the New York Liberty. Plenty of talent exists, the players union asserts, to fill these spots and keep the WNBA's caliber of play high.
But with 60-plus new roster positions, there's another place GMs should be looking: college underclassmen. With robust league expansion, it's necessary to revisit the topic of the WNBA's age restrictions, which are arguably the strictest in American pro sports. As the league and players association are at the negotiating table for the next collective bargaining agreement, which they hope to finalize this winter, the time is now.
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The W's counterpart of the NBA allows in players just one year removed from high school graduation. The NWSL, the other most successful U.S. women's pro sports league, can sign up to four players who are younger than 18. But the WNBA follows much tighter guidelines. American players must turn 22 the year of the draft, be a college graduate within three months of the draft or be four years removed from high school graduation. International players must be at least 20 during the year of the draft.
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The result is that few women's players even have the opportunity to leave college early. With the exceptions of Jewell Loyd (Notre Dame, 2015), Jackie Young (Notre Dame, 2019) and Satou Sabally (Oregon, 2020), no notable stars have made the jump before the end of their four college hoops seasons. Of course, plenty of college players beyond those three clearly have the physicality and skills to play professionally before turning 22.
The age limitations have long protected veterans across the league, but with so many new spots opening in the WNBA before 2030, it's hard to argue that veterans still need that protection. (And if they do, should they really be playing in the toughest league to break into in the world?)
There's another side to this, too. The WNBA certainly stands to benefit from the beefed-up talent pool, but would underclassmen want to leave early? As it stands with NIL and collectives (and whatever those become in this post-House settlement era), brand-building and annual salaries of certain college players have exceeded WNBA supermax salaries. But that doesn't inherently mean the college landscape is more financially lucrative to all players or that every player needs four years of college brand building to sustain their partnerships once they go pro, specifically, the most visible college players.
Caitlin Clark didn't need a fourth year at Iowa to secure the lucrative deals she has in the WNBA now. The 'she's going to take a pay cut to go pro' crowd has been mostly silenced as her net worth has only gone up. Paige Bueckers really didn't need anything past her freshman year at UConn to ink the kind of high-value deals she has now.
JuJu Watkins built enough brand awareness in her freshman season at USC that the potential endorsements awaiting her in the WNBA, if she had the opportunity to be one-and-done, wouldn't necessarily equate to her taking a cut. Leaving early would mean she'd lose the money from the collective and the future revenue sharing, but the WNBA just needs to find a way to make up for that money in salary. For players like Watkins, the NIL part isn't going anywhere.
. @USCWBB sophomore superstar and last year's NCAA Freshman of the Year, @Jujubballin, shares her opinion of the WNBA's age limit/early entry rules.
Full interview: https://t.co/MJCt9yI6wV pic.twitter.com/XSxNlyz1nl
— Sarah Spain (@SarahSpain) December 18, 2024
These players should be able to make the choice themselves, rather than being up against an arbitrary age limit.
Loosening age restrictions and drafting qualified players would be good for individual players, her future team and the league as a whole. With this shift in eligibility, the WNBA — given the tight window between the end of the season, the WNBA Draft and the transfer portal opening/closing — could also grant wider leeway for players who opted to withdraw.
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Player salaries are key points for the WNBPA in CBA negotiations, so players should use age restrictions as a potential bargaining chip. It's particularly salient of late as teams have seen what a boon Clark has been to the Indiana Fever's bottom line (as well as the league and Indianapolis). Knowing what Clark's entry could've meant to stakeholders — if she had been able to come even a year earlier — is significant.
Fever coach Stephanie White doesn't take a stance about amending age restriction rules. But she said it should be up for discussion — and the Fever's bottom line backs that up.
'Certainly, our ability to draft younger players — European players — is there,' White said. 'Everything is on the table right now in terms of conversation. In terms of what are the best solutions? I'm not sure.'
Imagine the power this could have for player salaries at the negotiating table: You want the potential to draft Watkins sooner rather than later? Great. Then owners had better ante up for rookie salaries, and benefits that are better than what USC's collective can pay her outside of her brand endorsements. You want to cash in on LSU star Flau'jae Johnson's skill, spark and fan appeal? We get it. But you had better be ready to pay her what she'd be worth to the league.
Even the potential of landing Watkins or Johnson or the next women's basketball star could potentially increase salaries for all players in the league.
Dropping the age restriction or using a rule similar to the NBA doesn't mean every eligible 19-year-old will enter the draft (if someone does, and goes undrafted, that's their choice). With roster limits at 12, even with an expanded league, many teams can't be as patient with young prospects as the NBA can with larger rosters and its developmental G-League. But changing the age restriction gives the option to rising sophomores and underclassmen who are good enough to make it in the W, and that seems like a win-win for players and the league as long as all parties are informed and aware of the risks.
As the WNBA has existed in the past, the idea of encouraging a 19-year-old to opt for a league with limited roster spots, abundant cuts and a low salary seems unwise with the lucrative college landscape as an alternative. But as the WNBA expands, the choice should become harder. With 210-plus spots, if a rookie can make a better entry salary, further her own skills and boost a league on the rise — largely due to recent young stars — then it's the right move for all.
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In the 2021 NWSL season, when Olivia Moultrie was 15 and training with the Portland Thorns but ineligible to play because the age restriction was 18, she filed an antitrust lawsuit against the league. She reached a settlement with the NWSL, opening the door for her and others under 18 to join the league.
Two years later, when the Thorns won the title in 2023 and she got her turn at the mic during the team's celebration, she said: 'All I can say is, going to court was worth it to play here.'
She was 17 at the time. Without her lawsuit, she would've been ineligible to earn her salary or be a part of that team. Instead, the midfielder who started eight games that season for the Thorns was living her dream, helping them win a title and boosting a league that was growing significantly.
The WNBA shouldn't wait for a lawsuit like Moultrie's to open its doors to more young talent, especially when it is laying the red carpet out for more teams (and more roster spots). Not every teenager will enter the WNBA Draft, but for the ones who are good enough, they shouldn't have to wait and neither should the league.
(Photo of JuJu Watkins: Andy Lyons / Getty Images)