Two of the Liberty's 17 home dates for this season are still scheduled to take place at MSGNBAE/GETTY IMAGES
The WNBA season tipped off this weekend and the Liberty began its campaign with a "for-sale sign over their heads, a new head coach and a new home arena," according to Seth Berkman of the N.Y. TIMES. MSG Co., which has owned the Liberty since '97, announced in November that it intended to sell the franchise, but when a buyer had "not surfaced by February, the company moved the Liberty's home court" from MSG to the suburban Westchester County Center in White Plains. Two of the Liberty's 17 home dates are "still scheduled" for MSG. The Westchester County Center has an "official capacity of 5,000, but the Liberty are expected to configure seating in a way that allows about 2,300 spectators, with an option to expand to as many as 4,500." The Liberty said that it "could not yet calculate its sales of season tickets or individual ones" for the team's home opener Friday against the Lynx (NYTIMES.com, 5/19).
NO OTHER OPTION: The Sparks began open their season yesterday with a buzzer-beating win against the Lynx, and in L.A., Bill Plaschke noted some players "will have just arrived" while some "still won't be there." Most of them "will have not played together in months" as a number of regular team players this offseason were "busy making a living playing professional basketball overseas." Most players would "rather play only in the WNBA, but the WNBA pays them as much as 10 times less than some foreign teams." More than 75% of the league "plays in both places, playing for virtually the entire year, and these annual spring homecomings are no parades." Sparks coach Brian Agler said, "It's not ideal for anybody. We were practicing with 10 players who weren't even going to be on our team." Plaschke wrote despite the "economic and perceptual gains made by women's sports" in the U.S., some of our "greatest female athletes still have to leave the country to get the most out of their abilities." In some ways, the WNBA has "never been stronger." It "easily remains the best, most competitive women's basketball league in the world." But even at its "healthiest, in a crowded American sports landscape, it still can't come close to attracting the sort of attention and revenue that can turn it into a full-time job." The WNBA has a "hard salary cap with a rookie minimum salary of $50,000 and a veteran max of around $115,000." Some of those same players "can make $500,000 a year playing overseas, where wealthy owners view their teams as a status symbol worth an endless investment" (L.A. TIMES, 5/20).
