The WPBL raised about $3 million and drew 55,000 fans in its first season. Its largest outside investor now says she can't get a straight answer on where the money went.
This week
See all →All posts
See all →- Women's baseball came back this summer. Its investors are suing each other over the books.
- Mbappé didn't sign with On. He bought in.
On ended Mbappé's 20 year run with Nike by reportedly handing him equity instead of just a paycheck, the same structure it used to sign Roger Federer, now aimed at football's biggest market.
- Chelsea cost £4.2 billion in 2022. Boehly's slice just sold for £950 million.
Boehly and Mark Walter walked away with a combined £950 million for the stakes they bought in 2022, as Clearlake Capital consolidated full control of the club.
- Garcia and Benn split $30 million. Saudi Arabia paid the bill.
Nevada no longer requires purse disclosure, so the real number is an estimate, but the funding source behind it is on the record: Saudi Arabia's Sela, not the gate or TKO itself.
- Every IPL team starts with the same ₹125 crore purse. Their valuations aren't identical at all.
A flagship deep dive: the IPL locks every franchise to the same auction purse and the same guaranteed central payout, on purpose. What it can't equalise is what a franchise is actually worth, and that gap is the real business of Indian cricket.
- NHL players just got a record $170 million refund. They shouldn't have needed one.
The NHL handed players back a record $170 million this summer under its escrow system. That number only exists because the system took the money away from them first.
- RCB just sold for $1.78 billion. Its wage bill won't move an inch.
Diageo turned a $112 million cricket bet into a billion-dollar exit, but the fixed auction purse that decides what RCB can actually spend on players next season is exactly the same as everyone else's.
- UFC's TV deal doubled to $1.1 billion a year. Its fighters got a bigger bonus pool instead of a bigger cut.
Paramount is paying the UFC roughly double what ESPN did. The fighters got doubled bonuses too, which sounds generous until you look at what share of the business those bonuses actually represent.
In brief
FootballMonaco needed to sell two players to satisfy its regulator. Deadline day gave them neither.
CricketThe Big Bash still has an A$3.18 million salary cap. It just stopped telling clubs how to spend it.
FootballJeff Bezos just bought into Liverpool. The stake size tells the real story.
BasketballThe Lakers just sold for $12.5bn. The buyers are worth $6bn combined.
Flagship · FootballManchester United's Real Balance Sheet: Two Decades Of Debt, One Very Expensive Way Out Of It
FootballTwo Leagues, Two Very Different Kinds Of Unequal
Big Deals Tracker
See all →The Ledger
See all numbers →Lakers$12.5bn
McLaren F1$4.1bn
Padres$3.9bn
RCB$1.78bn
$250m~$1.6bn
20212026
+89%
Rise in two years since the cost cap was introduced.
The Index
Football
Chelsea cost £4.2 billion in 2022. Boehly's slice just sold for £950 million.
Basketball
The Lakers just sold for $12.5bn. The buyers are worth $6bn combined.
Cricket
RCB just sold for $1.78 billion. Its wage bill won't move an inch.
Women's sport
Women's team values: our first piece is on the way
Coming soon
Chart of the Week
Premier League wage bills this season. Club figures vary by source.
Manchester City's wage bill is four times Brentford's. Real Madrid's is over twelve times Levante's.
Premier League clubs will pay a record €2.41bn in wages this season, more than 65% above La Liga. Yet La Liga has the wider gap between its richest and poorest clubs.
Read the piece →