The Washington Mystics’ training camp is underway. The team has about $3.77 million in salaries before unprotected draft picks and training camp contracts are signed to the opening day roster, per Her Hoop Stats. Once players like Angela Dugalic and Cotie McMahon are on the opening day roster (they almost definitely will). Also, per Her Hoop Stats, the Mystics have the most cap room of all teams, before signing unprotected draft picks and training camp players who make the rosters.
Even then, Washington would still have over $1.5 million in cap space available. This is assuming the Mystics sign five more players at minimum salaries. All players except Shakira Austin and Michaela Onyenwere are on rookie scale contracts, and any new players who get signed from the training camp roster will likely get that same amount.
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The WNBA’s maximum salary cap is set at $7 million. But it’s unclear from looking online at what the minimum salary cap is – and this number would exist. But per the previous WNBA CBA (again, Her Hoop Stats has a strong explainer on it here), if a team does not have a total cap hit to hit the minimum salary cap, then there will be shortfall payments made to players to reach that gap. Basically, the players on the Mystics would get a bonus. This is to ensure that players are getting their fair share of revenue sharing.
Teams are disincentivized to give shortfall payments, so it wouldn’t shock me to see the Mystics sign a free agent at a high salary to avoid this situation and have one less player on a rookie minimum. However, given the front office’s vision, this rebuild is centered around youth with Sonia Citron, Kiki Iriafen and Shakira Austin as the clear centerpieces.
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