In 2022, Brittney Griner was detained in Russia after authorities discovered cannabis oil in her luggage. The WNBA star spent nearly 300 days in Russian custody, uncertain whether she’d be able to return to U.S. soil and be reunited with her family and teammates.
Brittney Griner’s participation in Unrivaled is a reminder why the league exists in the first place
After being detained in Russia, Griner vowed she’d never play overseas basketball again. Now, she has an opportunity to stay in the U.S. during the WNBA offseason — while still getting the chance to play professional basketball.
Photo by Jordan Johnson/NBAE via Getty Images
Noa Dalzell is a senior writer covering the WNBA and all of women’s basketball for Breakaway, SB Nation’s women’s sports vertical, as well as the Celtics for CelticsBlog.
After she was finally released in a prisoner swap, Griner vowed she’d never play overseas basketball again — unless it was for the U.S. Olympic team. (She ultimately served as a member of the Olympic team that won gold in Paris in august).
“That would be the only time I’ll leave the US soil, and that’s just to represent the USA,” Griner told reporters a few days prior to the 2023 WNBA season. “The whole reason a lot of us go over is the pay gap.”
Now, nearly two years late after her prolonged detainment, Griner has once again committed to playing professional basketball during the WNBA offseason. However, rather than having to go play in a foreign country as she did for so many the winters, the six-time All-Star is headed to Miami, where she’ll join 29 other WNBA stars in a new 3x3 basketball league that aims to shake up the landscape for women’s professional basketball: Unrivaled Basketball League.
In Miami, Griner’s teammates and competitors will include a number of standouts, including Unrivaled’s two co-founders — Breanna Stewart and Napheesa Collier — as well a slew of other stars, like Kelsey Plum, Satou Sabally, Angel Reese, and Arike Ogunbowale. The league will begin in January and run for 8 weeks, hosting 3x3 games multiple nights per week that will be be broadcast for fans to watch at home, though the details of the media deals
When Collier and Stewart came together to create Unrivaled, they did so with the hope that it would allow players to stay in the U.S. when their season is over.
“It’s really important to us,” Collier told The Associated Press in May. “Compensation is a huge part of Unrivaled, as a league and a business. All the players in this first year will have equity in the league. For players to have a piece of the pie — essentially to grow their generational wealth — is something we’re really excited about.”
It’s been well-chronicled that players make more money overseas, and though the WNBA has exploded in popularity this season, salaries remain relatively low. On average, WNBA players make $119,000 per year, while rookies make between $64,154 and $76,535 in their first season. Griner, one of the WNBA’s more decorated athletes, made $150,000 this past year as the starting center on the Phoenix Mercury.
As a new 3x3 league, Unrivaled will take a different approach than the WNBA, both in format and in pay structure. Each team will be made up of five players and a head coach (some of whom also coach in the WNBA), and each player will have an equity stake in the league, as well as a minimum salary of $100,000.
Brittney Griner marks the third Mercury player to publicly commit to the league, joining teammates Kahleah Copper and Natasha Cloud. While she’s one of the older players to make the move, she’s not the only one: Skylar Diggins-Smith, who is 34 years old, and Tiffany Hayes and Courtney Vandersloot — both of whom are 35 — have also publicly committed to participating.
And, while Griner is not quite the dominant defensive presence she once was, she’s still a highly impactful player. This season, the three-time Olympian averaged 17.8 points, 6.6 rebounds, and 2.3 assists, helping Phoenix to a playoff berth.
With Griner’s addition, the full list of Unrivaled Basketball League players now includes 24 players: Allisha Gray (Dream), Angel Reese (Sky), Arike Ogunbowale (Wings), Breanna Stewart (Liberty), Brittney Sykes (Mystics), Brittney Griner (Mercury), Chelsea Gray (Aces), Courtney Vandersloot (Liberty), Dearica Hamby (Sparks), DiJonai Carrington (Sun), Jackie Young (Aces), Jewell Loyd (Storm), Kahleah Copper (Mercury), Kayla McBride (Lynx), Kelsey Plum (Aces), Marina Mabrey (Sun), Napheesa Collier (Lynx), Natasha Cloud (Mercury), Rhyne Howard (Dream), Rickea Jackson (Sparks), Satou Sabally (Wings), Skylar Diggins-Smith (Storm), Shakira Austin (Mystics), and Tiffany Hayes (Aces).
Needless to say, it’s a long, talented list.
Over the next couple of weeks, six additional WNBA players will be announced, two of whom are expected to be rookies, per Collier. Three-time MVP A’ja Wilson has already revealed she won’t be playing, while Caitlin Clark similarly insinuated that she’ll instead take the offseason to relax.
There’s a slew of other 2024 All-Stars who have yet to confirm nor deny their participation, a list that includes Alyssa Thomas, DeWanna Bonner, Sabrina Ionescu, Kelsey Mitchell, Aliyah Boston, Jonquel Jones, Brionna Jones, and Nneka Oguwmike. As it currently stands, the Indiana Fever are the only WNBA team with no players publicly committed to playing in the league.
Everything about Unrivaled is still new and uncertain, and the roll-out has taken place on an every-few-day basis, with player announcements happening on social media.
The confirmation that Brittney Griner will be participating, however, serves as the perfect example of why the league exists in the first place.
