# Women's sports **URL:** \ **Category:** The Game Room\ **Tags:** basketball-nba\ **Created:** [March 1, 2026, 6:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/womens-sports/1028113 "2026-03-01T18:38:34Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![steronz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steronz/32/11765_2.png) [@steronz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/steronz)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2026, 9:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/womens-sports/1028113/66 "2026-03-02T21:20:02Z")
Why are the accolades irrelevant? Imagine if instead of ranting about women, OP started a thread like this: “I don’t understand why anyone watches AAA baseball. The players are not as strong, fast, or capable as a major league team. Would any AAA team even stand a chance against a major league team?” Does it matter to fans? Do fans still want their local AAA teams to have good records? Would they not be exited if their team won the AAA championship? Does the fact that a pro team, which isn’t allowed to compete, would probably win the AAA championship if they were? Does that diminish the winning team’s pride? ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2026, 9:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/womens-sports/1028113/67 "2026-03-02T21:34:10Z")
> [@steronz](#): > > “I don’t understand why anyone watches AAA baseball. The players are not as strong, fast, or capable as a major league team. Would any AAA team even stand a chance against a major league team?” > > Does it matter to fans? Do fans still want their local AAA teams to have good records? Would they not be exited if their team won the AAA championship? Does the fact that a pro team, which isn’t allowed to compete, would probably win the AAA championship if they were? Does that diminish the winning team’s pride? I see your point, but a quibble is that AAA baseball / minor league baseball _is_ professional baseball, and a modern-day AAA team is a farm/developmental team for a Major League team: such a team’s primary reason for being is to develop young players to step up to the parent Major League team. They certainly draw fans to watch their games, but the nature of a AAA’s player base is much more transient than that of an MLB team, because the star players on your local AAA team are going to get promoted soon. But, similar to your point: I’ve been a fan of American (gridiron) football for my entire life. That’s primarily been expressed as being a fan of the NFL, and my hometown Green Bay Packers, but I’m also a fan of Canadian football, and the CFL. For that matter, I’ve kind of fallen out of love with the NFL over the last decade, for various reasons, and I’m at the point that I enjoy watching the CFL more than the NFL. CFL play is absolutely at a lower level of overall skill than the NFL, for a bunch of reasons, including that CFL teams have a salary cap which is a tiny fraction of the NFL salary cap ($6.3 million (Canadian), vs. $301 million for the NFL). American players who are fringe/backups in the NFL sometimes go to Canada, and wind up as starters and stars. Doesn’t matter to me. The Canadian sport is somewhat different from the American sport (field dimensions, number of players on the field, number of downs, motion before the snap), and is a different style of play, but the fact that very few CFL players would even be able to get a cup of coffee on an NFL team doesn’t detract from my enjoyment of the sport, as its own thing. ---
**Author:** ![RitterSport](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rittersport/32/6326_2.png) [@RitterSport](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RitterSport)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2026, 10:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/womens-sports/1028113/69 "2026-03-02T22:12:46Z")
> [@kenobi\_65](#): > > such a team’s primary reason for being is to develop young players to step up to the parent Major League team I thought it was for dollar hot dog nights and fireworks?? ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2026, 10:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/womens-sports/1028113/71 "2026-03-02T22:53:57Z")
> [@Velocity](#): > > It’s not about how much the women win, it’s about how much revenue and viewership the women’s game brings in compared to the men. Both of which are higher for the women’s US soccer team than for the men’s. > [@kenobi\_65](#): > > The U.S. women’s soccer team is tremendously more successful than the men’s team – they win gold medals, they win World Cups, things that the men’s team has never even come close to accomplishing – and had to sue in order to get paid as well as the men’s team does. And they win butts in seats, eyeballs on TV sets, and dollars in box offices. Which is exactly what a professional athlete’s job is. The women don’t do the same job the men do; they do a better job. ---
**Author:** ![Atamasama](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atamasama/32/12961_2.png) [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2026, 10:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/womens-sports/1028113/72 "2026-03-02T22:57:44Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > And they win butts in seats, eyeballs on TV sets, and dollars in box offices. Which is exactly what a professional athlete’s job is. Being a professional athlete is being an entertainer. It’s no different than being an actor or a musician. You go on a stage and perform for people, and if they are entertained, you did your job. That’s why so many former athletes go into jobs on television. It’s not that much of a career change. ---
**Author:** ![Velocity](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/velocity/32/18006_2.png) [@Velocity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Velocity)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2026, 11:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/womens-sports/1028113/73 "2026-03-02T23:57:49Z")
Fair enough, I stand corrected. However, I would point out that people can’t be lectured into being interested in something they are not interested in. If they prefer to watch men’s sports, telling them that women win more titles (in women’s sports) isn’t going to persuade them. The phenomenon of people following men’s sports more than women’s sports isn’t an America-only phenomenon; it is seen in many other nations as well. ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [March 3, 2026, 1:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/womens-sports/1028113/74 "2026-03-03T01:08:51Z")
> [@Velocity](#): > > However, I would point out that people can’t be lectured into being interested in something they are not interested in. Of course not, and I don’t think anyone here is trying to do that. What people are reacting to is the premise/opinion, stated by a couple of posters, that women’s sports are _de facto_ inferior to men’s sports, and cannot be otherwise, because men are superior athletically, and female teams/athletes would lose, badly, to men at comparable levels in their sports. @mglambo 's OP set out that he feels women’s sports are an inferior product, because women are inferior athletes: > [@mglambo](#): > > If I’m going to watch sports though I want to see the best athletes play that sport. I think that makes sense. It’s the entertainment business so why not watch the best? You don’t go to the theater to watch second rate actors. I have zero interest in watching women play any sports. I will use basketball as an example but it applies to all sports: When I pointed out to @nonobaddog that the USWNT has won a ton of soccer championships, far outperforming the performance of the USMNT, his response was dismissive: > [@On another topic](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1028367/61): > > So our “B” squad has a good record. Meh. Are they entitled to their opinions? Certainly. Do their opinions come across as a bit sexist? I’m pretty sure that they would vehemently disagree, but it comes across that way to me (I won’t speak for anyone else). I’ll also point out that @mglambo said this in his OP: > [@mglambo](#): > > NBA players are incredible athletes soaring above the rim, making incredible athletic plays. The women look like shorter, less athletic versions of the guys in the old film clips of the men in the fifties. Dribbling with their heads down, flipping up two hand set shots. “But their fundamentals are so good, their two hand chest passes are sublime" > > If I want to watch fundamentals I can do a YouTube video of that. The choice of picking on “but they’re good at fundamentals” is interesting, because it’s been a long-standing backhanded compliment/critique of women’s sports: “they’re good at fundamentals” is code for “but they aren’t _really_ athletic.” I can’t say for certain that he intentionally chose that phrase, but it stands out to me for that reason. ---
**Author:** ![steronz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steronz/32/11765_2.png) [@steronz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/steronz)\ **Post date:** [March 3, 2026, 1:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/womens-sports/1028113/75 "2026-03-03T01:55:23Z")
> [@Velocity](#): > > Fair enough, I stand corrected. > > However, I would point out that people can’t be lectured into being interested in something they are not interested in. Well, they’re going to keep trying, and be “they” I mean people in the sports entertainment business who want you to buy more product. Uninterested consumers, I dunno, feel some need to provide a _reason_ they’re not watching that’s _not_ sexist, and so we get threads like this where they’re preemptively arguing their case. But what they _should_ be saying is “why are all of these capitalists annoying me with sales pitches all the time?” Eta: Like, “I only want to watch the pinnacle of sports” is a bad reason, as this thread has established. It makes no sense because there’s lots of sports people enjoy that aren’t their respective pinnacles. So it’s a bad reason but it’s not a _sexist_ reason; it passes muster in that regard. But why do they need a reason? “I don’t enjoy the WNBA.” OK, fine, that was always allowed. ---
**Author:** ![mglambo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e8c25b/32.png) [@mglambo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mglambo)\ **Post date:** [March 3, 2026, 2:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/womens-sports/1028113/76 "2026-03-03T02:30:47Z")
Thanks to the 2 or 3 people who actually answered the question. ✌Out. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [March 3, 2026, 2:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/womens-sports/1028113/77 "2026-03-03T02:32:51Z")
Everyone in the thread has been answering you. If you wanted to talk about something else, you should have made a thread about that, instead of the thread you did make. ---
**Author:** ![Snarky\_Kong](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a183cd/32.png) [@Snarky\_Kong](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snarky_Kong)\ **Post date:** [March 3, 2026, 3:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/womens-sports/1028113/78 "2026-03-03T03:34:21Z")
2025-2026 average soccer national team attendance for the women is like 18.5k and the men is like 25.3k ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [March 3, 2026, 3:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/womens-sports/1028113/79 "2026-03-03T03:37:27Z")
In what sport? WNBA vs. NBA? ---
**Author:** ![Snarky\_Kong](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a183cd/32.png) [@Snarky\_Kong](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snarky_Kong)\ **Post date:** [March 3, 2026, 3:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/womens-sports/1028113/80 "2026-03-03T03:38:16Z")
edited ---
**Author:** ![hideousidiot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/858c86/32.png) [@hideousidiot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hideousidiot)\ **Post date:** [March 3, 2026, 8:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/womens-sports/1028113/81 "2026-03-03T20:36:35Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Everyone in the thread has been answering you. Absolutely not, @Chronos–the OP asked a crystalline-clear question about which level of men’s basketball would consistently beat the WNBA champs, and only a handful have even acknowledged, much less answered, that particular question. The vast majority of respondents have criticized, mocked, belittled and undermined the premise of the question (that men’s basketball is played at a higher level than women’s basketball) while contradictorily conceding that men have an undisputable physical advantage over women. @RickJay said, correctly, that "Literally no sane person on earth thinks that men athletes at a given level of accomplishment aren’t better than women athletes, at least not in 99.5 percent of sports. What is unclear is where this connects to popularity." The answer is: it doesn’t connect to popularity. At all. The OP never mentioned popularity—he merely expressed his opinion that women’s basketball didn’t interest him personally. Some people have responded by throwing in all sorts of off-topic non sequiturs such as @Der Trihs’ crack about the question depending on "Playing by whose rules, and with whose equipment? "It’s a round ball, and a round hoop, and that covers most of the rules and the equipment–but if you gave every single conceivable advantage to the WNBA rules and equipment, and gave the high school boys zero time to adjust to it. I think they’d figure it out by the second half of the game at the latest and mop up the floor with the WNBA champs. But Der Trihs’ cavil is irrelevant anyway—if he wanted to answer the OP’s question, he might have said. “With WNBA rules and equipment, they’d beat a Division I men’s team sometimes.” But he didn’t want to answer the OP’s question—he wanted to invent issues that might distract from the OP’s question. Color me undistracted. ---
**Author:** ![steronz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steronz/32/11765_2.png) [@steronz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/steronz)\ **Post date:** [March 3, 2026, 8:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/womens-sports/1028113/82 "2026-03-03T20:41:59Z")
There’s only one question mark in the OP, go back and read it again. That’s the question many of us answered. ---
**Author:** ![Atamasama](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atamasama/32/12961_2.png) [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)\ **Post date:** [March 3, 2026, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/womens-sports/1028113/83 "2026-03-03T20:43:03Z")
This is the question I answered in the OP. > It’s the entertainment business so why not watch the best? If you don’t want an answer to that, don’t ask it. ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [March 3, 2026, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/womens-sports/1028113/84 "2026-03-03T20:43:26Z")
> [@hideousidiot](#): > > Absolutely not, @Chronos–the OP asked a crystalline-clear question about which level of men’s basketball would consistently beat the WNBA champs Only _after_ he spent three paragraphs detailing his opinion that women’s sports are uninteresting and inferior to him, and poisoning the well for the thread. ---
**Author:** ![hideousidiot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/858c86/32.png) [@hideousidiot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hideousidiot)\ **Post date:** [March 3, 2026, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/womens-sports/1028113/85 "2026-03-03T20:43:44Z")
> [@mglambo](#): > > So let me ask what level of men’s team you think can beat the best WNBA team > > A. The Sacramento Kings > > B- A top 25 D1 team > > C- A good lower college division team > > D- The top high school team in the country > > E- A solid top level high school team in Baltimore It’s incredibly disingenuous to pretend that this isn’t asking a clear and direct question. ---
**Author:** ![steronz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steronz/32/11765_2.png) [@steronz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/steronz)\ **Post date:** [March 3, 2026, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/womens-sports/1028113/86 "2026-03-03T20:44:14Z")
It’s OK to acknowledge that there was another question in the OP. ---
**Author:** ![borschevsky](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/97f17d/32.png) [@borschevsky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/borschevsky)\ **Post date:** [March 3, 2026, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/womens-sports/1028113/87 "2026-03-03T20:44:15Z")
> [@hideousidiot](#): > > he merely expressed his opinion that women’s basketball didn’t interest him personally. Why did he do that? It seems a bit strange to want to ask a question, but then preface it with irrelevant facts about one’s personal preferences. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/womens-sports/1028113.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/womens-sports/1028113.md?page=5)