Despite earning far less with the Fever, Caitlin Clark’s value is demonstrated by her refusing to accept a $1 million offer.
For Caitlin Clark, 2024 was a significant year full with personal honors that I will discuss later. She did not, however, win a team championship, as the Iowa Hawkeyes lost to South Carolina 87-75 in the National Championship, their second straight final defeat following their 2023 loss to Angel Reese’s LSU. The Connecticut Sun defeated Clark and the Indiana Fever in the opening round. Nevertheless, she guided the team to their first postseason trip since 2016 and recorded their greatest win total (20) since the 2015 campaign, when Stephanie White led them to the championship. Expectations are higher for Clark and the Fever when White returns as head coach in 2025.
Caitlin Clark’s Unrivaled League Salary Offer and Refusal
With the WNBA season ending in October and the next one starting in May, Clark will be without top-tier competition for over seven months. The difference might have been less if she had decided to play in the Unrivaled League’s first season, which will see 36 WNBA players split up into six teams of six playing in a brand-new 3v3 basketball format.
“Anyone in our position would want Caitlin 100 percent,” said League President Alex Bazzell, who is married to Napheesa Collier, one of the league’s founders along with Breanna Stewart, in response to Clark’s absence. She is an outlier, and it is evident what kind of numbers she brings. After allegedly declining an offer of more than $1 million for the nine-week league, Clark made this remark. On the “Good Game with Sarah Spain” podcast, Bazzell discussed these and other aspects of the league’s first season.
In actuality, Caitlin Clark’s four-year, $338,056 contract with the Indiana Fever means that endorsements are her main source of income rather than her wage. Although it might seem foolish to decline over three times her four-year wage for only nine weeks of play, she doesn’t currently seem to be concerned about money. She obviously had reasons for declining the offer, as seen by the success of her endorsement arrangements. In addition to Clark’s absence, the Unrivaled League is creating history by paying its players equity, which is the highest average salary in women’s sports.
The True Cause of Her Absence
Regarding Clark, she skipped Unrivaled because she needed to rest. She just got a short vacation during the 2024 WNBA Olympic break before she was eliminated with the Fever. Since her junior year in 2023, when she juggled a hectic schedule that included NCAA games, a College Final loss to South Carolina just days before the WNBA Draft, preseason games, the regular season, and the playoffs, Clark hasn’t had that type of downtime. She deserves to relax after a demanding year of receiving individual honors and setting records, and don’t forget that she is only 22! However, Clark will surely put victory with her squad ahead of her own achievements in 2025.
For upcoming generations of women who want to achieve the highest level of athletic achievement, Clark is unquestionably a sports sensation and an inspiration. Among other achievements, her impact was crucial to the WNBA’s 2024 season, which set new records for attendance, viewership, and merchandise sales. Hopefully, she can stay injury-free and have a fantastic career. Let’s let her continue to astound us for the time being.
The most noteworthy of her several honors this year, in my opinion, are:
The second-ever female athlete to win Time Magazine’s Athlete of the Year award
AP The fourth female basketball player to win Female Athlete of the Year
All-time NCAA Division I scoring leader for both men and women
All-WNBA First Team and WNBA Rookie of the Year (5th rookie ever)
Iowa retiree Hawkeyes jersey number 22
WNBA Record for Single-Game Assists (19)
Record for WNBA Single-Season Assists (337)
