Not just a man's game: Why Women Should Trade Baking Pies for Watching Pigskin

For as long as I can remember, sports have primarily been the defining factor as to what makes a “man’s man”. Whether it’s the hanging team jerseys that greet you overhead in a local Modell’s or something as casual as a beer commercial for the Super Bowl with a group of men crowded around a 60” TV screen, men undeniably overpopulate sports culture. It’s common fodder that women are merely along for the ride when it comes to sports- forcibly watching games with their boyfriend while pretending to understand what’s going on, their highest level of participation in Super Bowl Sunday being a homemade guacamole dish for him and his boys, wearing pink Yankee jerseys simply to look cute at the stadium.

            Therein lies the dichotomy. Why are women and enjoying sports still seen as mutually exclusive things? The introduction of the WNBA in the late 90s, the popularity of female athletes such as Skylar Diggins and Lindsay Vonn, and the growing presence of female sports analysts, have created a growing middle in the Venn diagram of females and athletics. As an avid lover of [almost] all things sports-related, I am constantly pushing for women to take more of an interest in a male-dominated field.  These three reasons are why women should get comfortable with a man’s game and take charge:

1. Greater female interest in sports culture could lead to an increase in sponsorship for female athletes.

If you have ever watched a WNBA and an NBA game, one of the differences between them is their jerseys. NBA jerseys are simple and stylish for the most part: respective team colors with the organization’s name emblazoned across the front, with the player’s last name (or now, in some cases, nicknames) and number on the back. It’s the same for the WNBA, with one marked difference: a company logo perched atop the team name. Why is it that WNBA players are forced to essentially become walking billboards? The answer is simple: lack of big-name, high roller sponsors from companies like McDonalds, Gatorade, and Bud Light. If more women (especially those in higher places) took an avid interest in athletics, big name sponsors would see female professional sports as a viable business investment due to the high volume of interest generated by fans, not by the players themselves. That coupled with better marketing tactics could save the WNBA from financial ruin and put it on par with its more popular older brother.

2. More interest means more money for WNBA players.

In lieu of this, bigger sponsors mean bigger salaries. An NBA player earns an astonishing 70.8 times more his female counterpart: the average NBA player earned $5.15 million annual salary in 2013, while the average WNBA player earned only $72,000. First round draft picks in the NBA earn a minimum of $1.3 million at the 14^th pick cutoff point-WNBA rookies earn $35,000 at any rookie level, 37.1 times more than her male counterpart. The icing atop the cake of disparity is the gap in salary cap between both organizations: the NBA’s salary cap is currently set at $58 million, 70.9 times more than the WNBA’s mere $818,000. Even a shoddy player like Eddy Curry can afford to burn his year’s earnings and still have more money than the WNBA, which speaks volumes on the importance of female professional athletics. The key here is recruiting well-known males in the entertainment and sports industries to back the WNBA and vouch for the organization as a functional and highly profitable market of interest for both fans and businesses alike. Although popular female basketball players like Brittney Griner and Candace Parker help to boost the WNBA’s reputation as a viable place for superstar talent, it’s undeniable that having the backing of someone like Kevin Durant, Lebron James, or Chris Paul could skyrocket the popularity and marketability of the WNBA as a whole.

3. Female presence in sports culture will slowly but surely work to eradicate sexist overtones in the industry.

Melissa Ludtke, a female sports journalist, made her mark in 1977 by demanding that she be allowed into the locker room for post-game interviews during the 1977 World Series. Although she was granted permission to do so, this did not sit will with the players nor the coaches, and she felt like an outsider because she was one. Almost 30 years later, there are a greater number of publicly recognized and respected female journalists from the likes of Suzy Kolber to Sage Steele. The growing presence of female journalists have created a different dynamic for 21^st century women in sports: it is acceptable to be feminine and completely knowledgeable on something that was not designed for them to understand. To play upon a sexist point of view, having attractive woman like Hazel Mae give viewers the rundown on the status of current MLB players will generate more interest off of looks alone, and have men thinking twice about increasing female reporting on and off the field. The old saying “if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em” perfectly describe this.

Though we are conditioned to believe that women and athletics just don’t mix, the growing presence of women in sports combats the aforementioned antiquated notion. To pique interest, professional sports clubs should cater more to their female audience: filming comical commercials where a chick’s march madness bracket was the only correct one in her pool of male friends, having more female athletes star in endorsement commercials (remember that cool one where Mia Hamm was sweating lemon-lime Gatorade in 1997?), hiring more female correspondents on all major sports networks, even something as simple as approaching female fans during bar trivia.

This Super Bowl Sunday, we’ll bring the beers. You boys just worry about making the dip.