WNBA’s Marquee Brightens

Twin themes frame the WNBA’s 2001 kickoff today, the most visible being the largest influx of high-profile U.S. collegiate talent in the league’s five-year history.

Possible summer sightings on the marquees at the WNBA’s 16 NBA arenas:

“SEE JACKIE STILES HERE TONIGHT�

“TAMIKA CATCHINGS PLAYS HERE TONIGHT�

“AUSTRALIA OLYMPIAN LAUREN JACKSON HERE TONIGHT�

But what you won’t see on a marquee is a simmering labor beef. Unless, of course, the WNBA fixes its broken salary distribution system.

First, name recognition.

The class of ’01 couldn’t have arrived at a more opportune time, what with Cynthia Cooper switching to coaching and Sheryl Swoopes out for the year because of knee surgery.

It’s the first class to have played four years of college basketball after the WNBA started up in 1997. And it’s by far the best.

A sampling:

* Jackie Stiles. As the 5-foot-8 Stiles approached and then broke the NCAA career scoring record with one of the best pull-up jump shots, she became a national story. She learned the game starting at age 6 in tiny (pop. 600) Claflin, Kan., then carried her Southwest Missouri State team to the Final Four in St. Louis.

Portland drafted her fourth overall, ahead of half a dozen All-Americans.

* Tamika Catchings. When she comes off knee rehabilitation in several weeks, she just might hint at the talent that put Swoopes on marquees. The 6-foot “Catch� was the third pick, by Indiana, and there isn’t a coach in the league who doesn’t think she has MVP-type talent.

But then, what would you expect from the daughter of a former NBA player (Harvey Catchings)?

* Lauren Jackson. From Australia, here is the most talented rookie of all, wrapped in a 6-foot-5 package that came close to arriving in Los Angeles. The Sparks were willing to send veterans DeLisha Milton and Ukari Figgs to Seattle for rights to Jackson, 20, but in the end Storm Coach Lin Dunn spurned that and every other offer she fielded for the No. 1 overall pick.

Jackson is a premier rebounder and her shot extends to the three-point line.

Other rookies on the can’t-wait-to-see list are Miami’s Ruth Riley, twins Kelly Miller (Charlotte) and Coco Miller (Washington), Minnesota’s Svetlana Abrosimova, Utah’s Marie Ferdinand, Orlando’s Katie Douglas, Houston’s Amanda Lassiter, Minnesota’s Georgia Schweitzer and Indiana’s Neile Ivey.

For WNBA President Val Ackerman, that’s the best of it--marquee rookies, everywhere--although a cautionary note is that most players fresh from college have had difficulty scoring in double figures in their first year.

The bad news is that WNBA players are paid according to where they entered the league. The first four draft picks this year--Jackson, Kelly Miller, Catchings and Stiles--will make $55,000 this season. The next four make $48,400, and so on, down to the league minimum of $28,000.

Salaries are rising at about 5% to 10% per year, but the figures are draft-based, not merit-based. So while that’s great news for Jackson, Miller, Catchings and Stiles, it’s infuriating to Brandy Reed of Phoenix, who, in her third year in the league, was an all-star and finished third in scoring.

She was also the fourth-highest paid player on the Phoenix roster. Reed turned down a $50,000 contract from the league--which pays all salaries and has no provisions for free agency--then reversed herself and signed.

Another example: Center Taj McWilliams-Franklin of Orlando is a three-year veteran, an all-star who made $37,000 last year, almost $20,000 less than this season’s first four rookies.

The players signed off on all of this in the 1999 collective bargaining agreement, which expires after the 2002 season. They also have the option of reopening negotiations after this season.

Generally, U.S. players can make double to triple in Europe what they can make in the WNBA, and about 100 did play overseas. Reed made more than $100,000 playing in Turkey, for example. But most would prefer to play only in the U.S.

Ackerman maintains the WNBA is not profitable but that it’s “close� to making money.

The league charges an average of $15.50 per ticket, she points out. And don’t confuse the WNBA’s TV deals with the NBA’s, she adds. “Television contracts pay the NBA roughly $2 billion over four years,� she said.

“In the WNBA we have to pay to get our games on television. We are currently unprofitable, but there is a long-term goal to become profitable and that’s very much the expectation of the NBA owners who back us.�

The Sparks open the season Monday against four-time champion Houston at the Compaq Center.