Thursday the NWSL held their Media Day ahead of the Championship on Saturday. Spotrac was there for the action and here’s some highlights:

The State of the League

“This marks the third consecutive year that the NWSL has averaged more than 10,000 fans per game, this is the highest of any women’s professional soccer league worldwide and it’s 60% higher than any other league.” - Commissioner Jessica Berman

“On a club by club basis, six of NWSL clubs surpassed 10,000 attendance for every home match this season. That’s up from four in the 2024 season.” - Commissioner Jessica Berman

“Championship weekend has [definitely] grown. Thinking about the first two years I was in the Championship, we didn’t have a media day like this, we didn’t have awards ceremonies. Having a destination where you’re bringing everyone to a market and having this big weekend, it’s obviously a spectacle. Seeing that growth means that we’re trending in the right direction, and it’s been kinda cool, your parents can come, it’s a little bit of a party of a weekend. I’m thankful to be a part of a lot it so I’ve been able to see it grow.” - Emily Sonnett, Gotham FC

“We are investing for the long term and I want to highlight two really key points. The first is around infrastructure ... It's something that we think about when we really focus on how we're going to attract and retain top talent in this league, both players and technical staff, we're investing in that infrastructure, particularly around training facilities.” - Commissioner Jessica Berman

“Secondly, as we think about the long term, we have to call out our efforts to continue [to] drive the growth through expansion, and we announced most recently that Atlanta is going to be joining the League in 2028 as Team 17. That's important, not just because we know that that ownership top tier and that the market will help us to really fill out the geographic footprint of the fandom that we can bring together and elevate on a national level, but also knowing that US Soccer has planted their roots in Atlanta, that it will help us to build more connectivity to the US international team and to US Soccer.” - Commissioner Jessica Berman

“Most recently NWSL was ranked number one in the Opta power rankings in terms of the league's overall strength. And NWSL clubs comprise nearly half of the world's top 20 teams.” - Commissioner Jessica Berman

“There are teams in other leagues that could compete in our league, but there are no leagues that compete with our league” - Commissioner Jessica Berman

“[The league has seen] a big change. I used to live with a host family in DC and we used to do our own laundry; show up and play at the soccer plex and you never know what field you're getting on. We had a locker room, we walked into a big arena, you never knew if there were going to be 100 kids in there playing basketball. Now we have people who help and there is a huge support system. We have arguably, many many coaching staff and our support staff has grown – even since I was here two years ago. The league has grown a lot and I think it’s impressive how much support we’ve gotten, especially off the field. I’m hoping we continue to build and push on the field as well.” - Katie Stengel, Gotham FC

“[It’s] important to note our progress and really redefining our league, not as a domestic league, but a global league. That was readily apparent last night at the NWSL awards. If you look at the finalists for all of the key awards, if you look at who won all of our key awards, global talent is thriving in the NWSL. In 2013, the first NWSL championship had eight international players. We now have 19 international players hailing from 14 different countries and across the NWSL.” - Commissioner Jessica Berman

Calendar Swap/Scheduling

“We've been tracking this, not only in terms of what MLS might do, but the global international match calendar, and it's a very complex matrix for us to analyze” - Commissioner Jessica Berman

“There are certainly opportunities that can be created with us not overlapping with MLS, and then the schedule congestion for our summer calendar will be mitigated. On the other hand, there will, of course, be other challenges that it creates in terms of understanding and knowing stadium availability.” - Commissioner Jessica Berman

“There are significant pros and cons [to switching the schedule] and I am uncertain if we have the infrastructure as of yet to be able to do that because that would require many of the cold market teams to have properly heated fields both training and game fields. And just be prepared for a lot more weather issues, even though coming from Chicago and New Jersey I’m used to summer weather delays as well. To be able to align with the international schedule is a definite pro. Considering the climates that we have in the league, at this moment it would be difficult with the infrastructure that we have to make the switch and have it be smooth. It’s something that we’ll continue to evaluate every season, and especially now with the MLS, it would be difficult to be scheduling games with a schedule that’s almost opposite so there are definite considerations.” - Tierna Davidson, Gotham FC

Collective Bargaining Agreement & the Salary Cap

“The NWSL has raised the salary cap tremendously in each of the last four seasons that I've been here, I believe it's almost quadrupled in the last four years. What goes into the analysis of when and how we raise the cap has a direct relationship to our business.” - Commissioner Jessica Berman

‘“As a collective we absolutely want to continue to raise the salary cap and continue to pay our players, and that will continue to be a priority, and as the business grows, we will analyze that each and every season.” - Commissioner Jessica Berman

“We also know that compensation is not the only thing that players consider when deciding where to play, and we look at a whole host of factors, and that is on the basis of the conversations that we have with players from our league and from players around the world. They care about compensation, but they also care about the competition, who they're playing with and who they're playing against, and what the quality of that competition is. They look at the club and the infrastructure that the club has to offer, not just from a training facility, but in the stadium, and whether the stadium is full and feels like a professional sports environment. And finally, they look at the coaching, and they look at whether the quality, the development that they're going to get in their training environment is commensurate with what they believe they need to continue to compete, not just for their club, but their country.” - Commissioner Jessica Berman

“[Guaranteed contracts only] is great. I was a part of the league when contracts were semi-guaranteed, it’s tough. You never know when your number is up, having a guaranteed contract is huge because it gives people a sense of stability. ‘I am going to be here for 365 days so that means I can not only believe in myself and this team,’ but it also shows that the club believes in me too and they are willing to invest in my development because I’m going to be here. It’s huge for the league. It only has benefits because it forces clubs to be really intentional about the players they are signing. In terms of the players, it allows them to have a sense of security and know that they are believed in, loved, and cared about.” - Brittany Ratcliffe, Washington Spirit

“For me, [free agency pulling into mid-season] was just a change in America, it’s the way it’s done in the rest of the world. For me, it’s kind of normal. It’s really difficult for me to understand how people were forced to go play in places without their consent. Players, coaches, anyone should be able to choose where they want to work and where they want to live. I was very supportive of that decision.” - Head Coach Juan Carlos Amoros, Gotham FC

“Specifically, as it relates to Trinity Rodman, and candidly, any other top player in the world. We want those top players here in the NWSL, and particularly, we want Trinity in the NWSL, and we will fight for her, and we are excited to see her compete in the championship on Saturday.” - Commissioner Jessica Berman

“I almost forgot that we used to have [Expansion Drafts], free agency has come about and been such an enjoyable experience that the past has kind of been forgotten. This job has a lot of uncertainty and a lot of stress as it is, and so to add in ‘oh are you protected, are you not protected?’ To not have that is pretty nice. Or the possibility of being traded to protect from expansion, all those things happened. It's really nice for players who are free agents or would like to go to another place that's by their choice and my mutual choice is just incredible and exciting. I think players perform best when they are in a place where they want to be.” - Andi Sullivan, Washington Spirit 

“We do not believe the NWSL is a charity. We believe it's a business, and in order to treat it like a business, it means that the amount that our teams are investing has to have a rational relationship to revenue. When we go through that process of reviewing the overall ecosystem and the value proposition that we're offering to top talent and to our players, we're looking at the amount being invested in training facilities, in stadiums, in compensation for players. We have to look at it in the context of where our business is at.” - Commissioner Jessica Berman

“Our union and our players know and understand exactly the system that we've negotiated with the players [in] our CBA, and we're really confident in the level of information that we're sharing in that regard” - Commissioner Jessica Berman

Relocation of Teams

“The league, like most professional sports leagues, has a policy that determines how we think about relocation. It needs to be and should be initiated by the owner in the market or the league office. And right now, there are no current markets that are being evaluated for relocation. We think it's really important that in the event, relocation more effort to be considered that it is considered as a last resort” - Commissioner Jessica Berman