'There's no break': Overseas double duty is an offer many WNBA stars can't refuse

When Elizabeth Williams arrived in Istanbul for her first season playing professional basketball overseas in fall 2015, she was thrown into a proverbial fire. She had just finished her rookie season in the WNBA with the Connecticut Sun and it hadn’t gone as planned. Limited minutes and a midseason injury put a damper on he confidence and she could only hope to to regain it while playing in Turkey.

But first, she had to figure out how to get to practice.

“I didn’t know where I was going or what I was doing,” Williams laughs today, recalling just how out of her element she felt. “We were having issues with our transportation so we had to take the metro bus to practice. And I was just basically following my teammates around. They were my lifeline. But then I started to figure it out and eventually started taking the metro bus on my own. So, in that sense, you grow up and you learn how to explore new places on your own.”

Williams’s fourth WNBA season will tip off when her Atlanta Dream open their season on Sunday afternoon in Dallas after an offseason where she toiled for the Liaoning Zhongda Aluminium Flying Eagles of the Women’s Chinese Basketball Association, leading the team in points (17.0 per game), rebounds (2.1) and blocked shots (2.3).

A four-time All-American at Duke University who was born in England before her family immigrated to the United States when she was a child, Williams is one of many WNBA players who’s made a habit of living and playing overseas during the American offseason.

“It’s because of the WNBA that we’re able to make good money playing overseas in the first place and make a name for ourselves,” Williams said. “And there’s a lot of things that go into playing basketball here that you don’t think about and you realize how much you miss when you’re overseas. Being away from family and friends for an extended period of time is tough. It’s a sacrifice.”

This past year, nearly 90 out of 144 WNBA rostered players spent time playing overseas during their offseason. Those who choose not go abroad usually take time to pursue additional career avenues, but for most WNBA players, particularly rookies and younger entrants, it’s a must if they want to maximize their earning potential, brand and visibility, and get even better at the game they love. Through late October to April – and sometimes even well into May when the WNBA preseason is already underway – these women live and play basketball all over the world, while simultaneously immersing themselves in different cultures, learning new languages, sampling exotic foods and competing against some of the best basketball players around the globe.

Alex Harden, who got her start in the league in 2015 when she was drafted by the Phoenix Mercury, saw limited minutes her rookie year and then went straight to Turkey and wound up with Quinta dos Lombos in Portugal’s Liga Feminina de Basquetebol (LFB) for her first taste of overseas basketball.

“As a whole, it’s just a great experience overall,” Harden explained. “As far as playing, as a rookie coming out of college, I learned so much from watching WNBA players [during that first season] and then when I got overseas I had a chance to show all the knowledge that I had learned.”

Harden, whose most recent offseason stint with Elektra Ramat Hasharon of the Israeli Female Basketball Premier League ended in March, says she takes playing overseas in stride and makes the most of it. Yes, players go overseas to help supplement their income, she says, but they also get to experience different cultures and travel the world. That’s something she loves to do.

“I like go out and walk around whatever city I’m in and try to learn the language and embrace everything that the culture has to offer– try new things, try new food. So, then I’m not just going to and from the gym every day. I would probably still play overseas even I didn’t have to because I love the experience of it.”

Jordan Hooper, another player who is early on in her pro basketball career, was drafted in 2014 by the Tulsa Shock (which then became the Dallas Wings) and bounced around the WNBA for most of 2017 before landing with the Chicago Sky this season. She’s been playing overseas since her rookie year for teams all over the world, including Istanbul, Turkey, Lebanon, Puerto Rico and most recently with the University of Canberra Capitals of Australia’s Women’s National Basketball League (WNBL).

“You get to experience different competition, different culture, different food, and different traveling experiences, which I think is kind of cool,” said Hooper. “I know a few players who hate it and once you’ve been doing it for a while, you can get tired of it. You’re missing out on your family and on holidays, and on everyday life that you’re used to. So, I get that. But I don’t hate it. Ultimately, I really do enjoy it because I think it broadens your horizons and your game.”

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Still, as rewarding as the overseas experience can be, it’s also an extremely exhausting endeavor to be playing nonstop, year after year, with little time to rest and recoup in between WNBA seasons. For veteran players like Diana Taurasi who have been in the year-round basketball cycle for over 10 years or more, the grind can grow tiresome. That’s why in 2015, in part because her foreign team, UMMC Ekaterinburg in Russia, offered to pay her WNBA salary on top of her base earnings to rest her body instead of playing in the WNBA, Taurasi took time off.

“I’ve been going overseas for 13 years straight and playing year-round with the national team, there’s times where I’ve had to take a little break and kind of step of way from the game to recharge mentally and physically,” she said.

“I would love to just stay in the states and play one season and one season only and have an offseason where I could get to work out really hard with some trainers and a nutritionist like LeBron,” added Hooper, who purposely chose to play in Australia this past season so that she could be finished by January and have four months to recoup before the WNBA started up again. “We go really hard here and then we go overseas and we go really hard there. There’s no break. I think that would be great if somehow someway they could figure it out where we can just stay here. It would help with the wear and tear on our bodies. And it gets harder as you get older.”

Not only do WNBA players not have the kind of offseason break that NBA players get to enjoy, the two leagues also have very different pay models.

According to salary breakdown in Forbes, NBA players enjoy about 50% of league revenue while it’s estimated that WNBA players receive less than 25% of the revenue. The average salary in the WNBA starts at around $50,000 and caps at $110,000. By comparison, the average starting salary for NBA players is about $550,000. Last year’s WNBA Most Valuable Player, Sylvia Fowles, only made $109,000 for the season – and that’s on the higher end scale of pay. To put it in perspective, WNBA superstars like Fowles and Taurasi earn only 20% of an NBA superstar’s salary. Overseas, Taurasi makes 15 times as much. And WNBA players in general make at least three times more from their foreign teams than their average WNBA salary.

“The money is a way where a lot of us make a living,” Taurasi confirmed. “But in 13 years, I’ve also gotten to see all of Europe and met some really great people, and I’ve played on some tremendous teams that you know, made it really enjoyable to be over there and they were like family. I’ve been really lucky.”

Hooper echoed a similar sentiment.

“I really do enjoy it, even though it’s hard. But it’s also made me realize that I take a lot of things for granted. I understand how blessed I am, and I’m very grateful for everything I have. I have friends all over the world now and I think that’s pretty cool to say.”