Is the WNBA Going to Be Around Much Longer?

Facing one of the worst recessions in this country's history, amid an already turbulent time for their league, the W.N.B.A. is now facing the brink of elimination as it enters its 13th season.

With the W.N.B.A. facing attendance lows, financing issues, and a decreasing number of available sponsors, it appears as if it's quite possible that this league doesn't have a lot of time remaining on the clock. Here are 5 grave issues concerning the W.N.B.A. and its existence as they prepare to start the 2009 regular season.

Reason #1 - The Players Finances Aren't Taken Care Of.

Overall, W.N.B.A. players are not by any means rich. Sure, you have Lisa Leslie, who probably makes a ton of money via modeling and sponsorships, but after her, just about no one else in the W.N.B.A. is making a truckload of money The maximum salary for a player of 6+ years in the league is $99,500 this season. Many of the players make the bulk of their money by playing overseas in Europe, where the pay is much more lucrative. You can't really expect to have a successful league when many of the players feel the need to play in other leagues where they make more money. But this is how the W.N.B.A. has operated since its inception. Could you imagine the NFL surviving if its best players were playing in China every offseason? It just takes the players out of the limelight too long, makes fans question their loyalties, and probably provides for a lesser product because the players aren't given enough time to recover from season to season

Reason #2 - People Are Not Watching on Television.

Last year, the average national broadcast of a W.N.B.A. garnered 413,000 viewers. That's good if you're a local news station, but in the world of professional sports that's not going to cut it. The NBA averaged 1.4 million viewers last year, and unless the WNBA can begin to get closer to that number, it's unlikely that they will continue to get national air time-a fate that would devastate the sport. Just look at a sport like hockey, which is also struggling to survive. Hockey gets just over 300,000 viewers per nationally televised game, and they are hanging on by a thread, already having contracted the league's number of teams, and having gone through an suspension in operations of their own.

Reason #3 - People Are Not Watching in the Arenas Either.

The early growth of the W.N.B.A. was very promising. They went from an average 9,669 attendees in their 1997 opening season to 10,869 the next season. But since then, it has been a steady fall all the way down to an average attendance of 7,931 in 2008. If people stop going to these games, this is going to be a huge loss of revenue for individual franchises. Things are looking promising so far in 2009, but it's likely that the "opening season" effect will wear off soon, and the numbers will probably come crashing back down to reality.

Reason #4 - They Have Lost Their Flagship Team.

I was around for the start of the W.N.B.A., and I remember the dominance exuded by the Houston Comets, who won the league's first 4 championships. But now due to financial reasons, Houston is no more, and the team that essentially saw the W.N.B.A. through its infancy is no longer there. That's like losing Green Bay in football or saying goodbye to the Celtics in basketball. It's just not a good look for the league, and they will lose a lot of history without the presence of that Comets team.

Reason #5 - They Are Losing Flagship Players.

Not only are teams leaving the league, but players are too. Lisa Leslie, the very women who stood at the press conference announcing the league's birth, has announced her planned retirement for the end of this season. While that day certainly had to come eventually, it could not have come a worse time. Losing their league's all-time biggest star, in their 2nd biggest city is scary. Who knows how many fans they will lose as a result of this. Even the NBA could barely withstand the brunt of Michael Jordan's exodus in 1998. So who knows what this will do to a struggling league like the W.N.B.A. Also, Sheryl Swoopes continues to find herself without a team, and Candace Parker, their latest star, is missing at least half the season on maternity leave.

And those are just a few of the problems that the W.N.B.A. is facing. From having to put sponsored logos on their jerseys to cutting their rosters down from 13 to 11, the W.N.B.A. is in serious trouble and has a lot of work to do if they want to avoid permanent elimination.