{"id":556015,"date":"2026-03-23T20:43:10","date_gmt":"2026-03-23T20:43:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/556015\/"},"modified":"2026-03-23T20:43:10","modified_gmt":"2026-03-23T20:43:10","slug":"is-caitlin-clark-a-free-agent-why-wnba-free-agent-frenzy-could-realign-the-league","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/556015\/","title":{"rendered":"Is Caitlin Clark a free agent? Why WNBA free agent ‘frenzy’ could realign the league"},"content":{"rendered":"

This WNBA offseason is unprecedented.<\/p>\n

The Women’s National Basketball Players Association on Monday voted unanimously<\/a> in favor of the new collective bargaining agreement<\/a>\u00a0that will see salaries rise around the league. It will also see the majority of the league’s veteran players hit free agency at the same time next month.<\/p>\n

This is by design. Players like Kahleah Copper, Breanna Stewart and A’ja Wilson intentionally signed short-term deals under the 2020-era CBA to set themselves up for a payday when the new CBA came into effect — whether that is with their current teams, or somewhere else.<\/p>\n

These players each can sign new $1.4 million supermax contracts when they hit the market on April 9<\/a>. But younger players like Paige Bueckers and even Caitlin Clark will have to wait.<\/p>\n

Why Clark is not a free agent<\/p>\n

Though more than 100 WNBA players are set to hit free agency next month, Clark will not be among them.<\/p>\n

That’s because the superstar guard is in the third year of her rookie-scale contract, which runs through the 2027 season.<\/p>\n

However, a provision in the new CBA means Clark is in line to earn a maximum salary sooner than she would have under the old agreement.<\/p>\n

The Exceptional Performance on Initial Contract (“EPIC”) clause will see Clark — by virtue of her All-WNBA selection in 2024 — gain eligibility to sign a $1.3 million-per-year max contract extension with the Indiana Fever in 2027.<\/p>\n

Clark’s salary for 2026 already is going up as rookie-scale contracts under the old CBA are being revised. The 24-year-old is slated to make around $530,000 in her third WNBA season.<\/p>\n

More WNBA news:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"This WNBA offseason is unprecedented. The Women’s National Basketball Players Association on Monday voted unanimously in favor of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":556016,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[629],"tags":[49,48,82,630],"class_list":["post-556015","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wnba","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-sports","tag-wnba"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/556015","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=556015"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/556015\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/556016"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=556015"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=556015"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=556015"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}