​In the summer of 1997, I was a young sports reporter in Salt Lake City and got an assignment that, at the time, didn’t exactly feel like covering the Super Bowl. I was a sideline reporter for the Utah Starzz during the inaugural season of the WNBA. Yes, Starzz. With two Z’s. It was Utah in the ’90s. Apparently, everything needed to rhyme with Jazz.I remember standing in the arena during that first season. Looking around some nights at what felt like a few hundred people scattered throughout a building designed for thousands more. The official numbers were better than my memory makes them seem. Utah averaged 7,611 fans that first season, but the Starzz still ranked dead last in attendance in an eight-team league. I remember thinking something that, almost 30 years later, I can safely admit. This thing isn’t going to make it. Great call, John. Thankfully, social media didn’t exist yet to preserve that take for eternity.30 Years To SuccessThe WNBA began in 1997 with eight teams and a 28-game schedule. I respected the players and the basketball, but I certainly didn’t see what was coming. I’m pretty sure nobody standing next to me in Salt Lake City was whispering, “Just wait 30 years until these franchises are worth hundreds of millions of dollars and Amazon is fighting for streaming rights.” Yet here we are.I work in the Bay Area, where the Golden State Valkyries are only in their second season and have already been valued at $1 billion. The first women’s sports franchise to reach that mark. The average WNBA franchise is now valued at roughly $460 million. That’s an incredible business story. But the sports media story may be even better, because networks don’t pay for good intentions. They pay for eyeballs.This past Sunday, ESPN delivered its most-watched @WNBA game EVER!@AtlantaDream–@IndianaFever averaged 2.6M viewers, 4M peak Up 178% vs last year’s ESPN reg. season average WNBA on ESPN networks up 16% YoYMore: https://t.co/uXmX1dnE5Wpic.twitter.com/yPsJhzgz1B— ESPN PR (@ESPNPR) August 18, 2026Go back to 2023, the season before Caitlin Clark entered the league. WNBA games on ESPN platforms averaged roughly 440,000 viewers. Then Clark arrived. In 2024, ESPN’s regular-season WNBA audience jumped 170%, averaging nearly 1.2 million viewers. The WNBA Draft averaged 2.4 million, up 328% from the previous year,. The All-Star Game drew 3.4 million, the largest audience in the event’s history. ESPN’s social engagement around WNBA content increased 413%. Video views exploded 642%. Those aren’t participation trophies. Those are media numbers.Caitlin ClarkIt would have been easy to dismiss 2024 as simply the Caitlin Clark phenomenon, and let’s be clear: Clark changed the business. Pretending otherwise is like saying Tiger Woods didn’t change golf television ratings. She brought millions of people through the front door who weren’t watching before. The bigger question was whether they would stay.Then 2025 happened.