Thursday, March 28, 2024

Skylar Diggins-Smith Uses Harrison Barnes to Highlight NBA/WNBA Pay Gap

*WNBA star Skylar Diggins-Smith is speaking out about the wage inequalities between the league and the NBA and recently compared her value to Dallas Mavericks forward Harrison Barnes to support her argument.

“I’m the highest-paid player on the Dallas Wings, and my salary is in the low six figures,” Diggins-Smith said on Wealthsimple.com.

“Harrison Barnes, the highest-paid player on the Dallas Mavericks, made $24 million last season. He’s definitely younger than me. Do you know his stats? Was he an All-Star? I mean, it doesn’t matter. But last year, I was first-team All-WNBA, which only goes to five players. I was also a WNBA All-Star for the third time.”

OTHER NEWS YOU MIGHT HAVE MISSED: Maxwell Announces 20th Anniversary Re-Release of ‘Embrya’ on September 28

via TotalSports:

Barnes received a significant boost in money back in 2016, despite being an afterthought among fans in the league. Compare that to Diggins-Smith, who is a perennial all-star and top level talent year in and year out, and you will see she only made $115K this past season.

To be completely fair, NBA’s revenue is astounding compared to the WNBA, especially after the league received a $24 billion TV deal in 2014, and became effective in 2016. Diggins understands this, but points to the league revenue distribution.

“Players in the NBA get about 50 percent of the revenue. For women, the percentage is in the twenties,” Diggins-Smith added. “So before we even talk about base salary or anything like that, we don’t even get paid the same percentage of the revenue that we bring in, which is kind of unbelievable. People try to hijack this issue and say that women’s basketball may not be as interesting a game, because they disparage women in sports, period. But we don’t even make the same percentage of revenue! And jersey sales, we don’t get any of it. The men do. And I have had a top-five jersey for three or four years in the WNBA.”

As noted by the Bleacher Report, the minimum salary in the NBA is just over $838,000 and increases every season up to $2.39 million for a player with 10-plus years of service.

We Publish News 24/7. Don’t Miss A Story. Click HERE to SUBSCRIBE to Our Newsletter Now!

YOU MAY LIKE

SEARCH

- Advertisement -

TRENDING