Professional women’s basketball is at a turning point. The WNBA has been exploding in popularity, but a potentially contentious renegotiation of the league’s CBA could have us heading for a holdout. Meanwhile, many of the league’s top stars are participating in Unrivaled, a winter 3-on-3 league, and another offseason league, Athletes Unlimited, still exists, albeit without the same star power as when the offseason league began. But now we have a new challenger: Project B.
But what is Project B? Who’s going to play in it? Who’s funding the league? Some details remain murky, but let’s take a look at what we currently know about the newest addition to the professional women’s basketball world.
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What is Project B?
Let’s get this out of the way first: Project B isn’t necessarily meant to replace the WNBA. The league will play from November through April, creating a situation where players will theoretically be able to play in both leagues.
“Theoretically” is the key word, though. The current CBA allows players to play in offseason leagues as long as their playing obligations are done by the time training camp arrives. Saying that players can do both is operating under the assumption that the new CBA will still allow that. Until we see an actual agreement reached, we can’t know that for sure.
The other part is that Project B intends to pay large salaries – reportedly starting around $2 million – and the WNBA will likely feature huge increases in salary as well. Year-round basketball was a thing because of paltry WNBA salaries that meant players needed to supplement that. Will players be okay having essentially no offseason if they’re making enough money from just doing one of the leagues?
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As far as format, Project B is set to be a six-team league of 5-on-5 basketball. Recent offseason WNBA “competitors” have played by different rules, but this one appears to look a lot more like normal basketball.
The league will also not have “home” games. Instead, the season will be comprised of seven two-week tournaments held in various locations around the world, though notably not in North America, or at least not at the moment.
Who is playing in Project B?
Seattle Storm v Las Vegas Aces – Game Three | Ian Maule/GettyImages
The league has been slowly releasing the names of players. So far, we know that the following players are planning to play in Project B’s inaugural season: Alyssa Thomas, Jonquel Jones, Jewell Loyd, Kamilla Cardoso, Li Meng and Janelle Salan.
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Oh, and Nneka Ogwumike, which is probably the most notable name here. Not necessarily because she’s the best player in the league, but because Ogwumike is the president of the WNBA Players’ Association. That feels like a statement, right? We’ll see if this impacts CBA negotiations at all.
Okay, so what’s the funding situation?
This is where a lot of the confusion and mystery around the league comes into the picture. Where’s the money coming from?
Early on, there were rumors that the Saudi Wealth Fund was involved. Considering the backlash we initially saw about LIV Golf due to its funding coming from Saudi Arabia, the fact that multiple star women’s basketball players committed to Project B seemed…off, especially with names like Ogwumike involved. The WNBAPA has been involved in a number of high-profile civil rights causes, so Ogwumike joining a league funded by Saudi Arabia, considering its history of human rights abuses, was an odd move.
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Project B has stated that the league is not getting money from the Saudi Wealth Fund, though. Annie Costabile of Front Office Sports spoke to Project B cofounder Grady Burnett, who says that Saudi Arabia is “not a financial backer” of the league.
Is that true? Well…it’s complicated. Sela, which is owned by the Saudi Public Investment Fund, is one of the league’s event partners, but Burnett says League B is paying Sela, not the other way around.
So, Saudi Arabia might not be funding the league, but the question remains: Where is the money coming from? Big tech, apparently. Costabile reported that in addition to Mangrove Capital, Quiet Capital and Sequence Equity, the league’s funders include “a number of tech angel investors that Burnett said believe this league will have ‘tech-like promise and tech-like returns.'”
What does that last part mean? I have no idea. I generally try to know as little as I can about the tech world. But it does at least sound like the initial concern about the league being used as sportswashing are unfounded, so that’s a plus, as long as we don’t someday learn that we’re wrong about that.
This article was originally published on www.fansided.com as What is Project B, the latest women’s basketball league challenging the WNBA and Unrivaled.
