NWSL implements new ‘Rodman rule’ amid union opposition

The NWSL implemented a “high impact player” (HIP) rule on Tuesday, which would allow teams in 2026 to spend up to $1 million outside the salary cap on star players, like Trinity Rodman of the Washington Spirit, who meet certain criteria.

The news came minutes before the NWSL Players Association voiced its opposition, issuing a statement saying it would now take action to “enforce the rights of the players we represent.”

In Tuesday’s statement, the union said: “The NWSL Players Association opposes the League’s decision to move forward without negotiating on the High Impact Player Rule.

“Under federal labor law, changes to compensation within the salary cap are a subject of mandatory negotiation and not a matter of unilateral discretion. Fair pay is achieved through fair, collectively bargained compensation systems, not arbitrary classifications.

“A league that truly believes in the value of its players would not be afraid to negotiate.

“The NWSLPA has proposed a clear and legal alternative: increase the team salary cap to compete in a global labor market.

“Additionally, we have proposed that, through collective bargaining, we work together to create a system for projecting revenue sharing numbers in future years so that teams and players can negotiate multi-year agreements with certainty. The union remains ready and willing to engage in good faith negotiations.”

Earlier this week, NWSLPA Executive Director Meghann Burke told ESPN that creating such a rule requires collective bargaining and that the union opposes it.

“Our position is actually that this is beyond the scope of the league’s authority,” Burke told Abby Wambach and Julie Foudy on their “Welcome to the Party” podcast. “Our position is that they need to negotiate with us on this type of proposal, not just consult us.”

Burke told ESPN: “The league is trying to control and interfere by trying to dictate which players get paid what with this pot of money. Our position is that teams – the general managers, the football operations, the business people at the team level – are in a unique position to make decisions about how to structure their rosters, how to negotiate deals.

The league said Wednesday that under the new rule, each club can exceed the league’s established salary cap by up to $1 million for high-impact players starting in 2026.

The NWSLPA had proposed that the NWSL increase the salary cap by $1 million starting in 2026, which is the same amount of money the league has now allowed each team to spend via the HIP rule.

The league announced Wednesday that the threshold would increase from year to year at the same base rate as the salary cap. The additional allocation can be applied to a single player or split across multiple players, providing clubs with significant flexibility to recruit and retain high-impact talent while maintaining competitive balance. For any contract using this provision, the high impact player’s salary cap must be at least 12% of the base salary cap.

The league called the new measure a “historic increase in league investment” in a press release, noting that it will increase league-wide player spending by up to $16 million and a total potential investment of up to $115 million over the life of the current CBA.

“Ensuring our teams can compete to recruit the best players in the world is essential to the continued growth of our league,” NWSL Commissioner Jessica Berman said in a press release. “The high-impact player rule allows teams to strategically invest in top talent, strengthens our ability to retain star players and demonstrates our commitment to building world-class teams for fans across the league.”

The league said teams would be able to sign players under the rule “immediately, provided the terms of the contract do not require the team to use the rule until the effective date.”

The rule was implemented following the contract impasse involving Rodman, as well as the departures of U.S. women’s national team stars Alyssa Thompson and Naomi Girma earlier this year. Thompson and Girma left for transfers worth more than $1 million to join English club Chelsea.

In Rodman’s case, her contract expires at the end of December, meaning she could sign elsewhere without Spirit receiving any compensation.

The NWSL recently rejected a proposed contract between the Spirit and Rodman, alleging the deal violated the “spirit” of the rules and accusing Rodman of “preemptive circumvention of the salary cap.”

The NWSL Players Association subsequently filed a grievance on Rodman’s behalf against the league on December 3. In the grievance, the AP said the contract was legal and that the league’s veto of the deal violated at least five points of the collective bargaining agreement. It’s unclear how much the NWSL Players Association agrees with the NWSL’s latest announcement.

In Wednesday’s press release, the NWSL said that under the terms of the current collective bargaining agreement, the league had “exercised its discretion” to implement the new rule after “consultation” with the NWSLPA.

ESPN’s Jeff Kassouf contributed to this story.