Trinity Rodman signs record deal with NWSL despite union concerns

Trinity Rodman will be the highest-paid women’s soccer player in the world under a new deal that has tested the National Women’s Soccer League’s salary policies and its relationship with the players’ union.

The Washington Spirit forward, who helped the team to a championship immediately upon going pro out of high school in 2021, signed a landmark three-year contract that will pay her an estimated $2 million per year and keep her with Spirit through 2028. 

In signing the deal Thursday, Rodman ended months of speculation about whether she would be the latest U.S. Women’s National Team star to make the lucrative leap across the Atlantic.

The NWSL, founded in 2012, has long grappled with losing top-tier players to more established European and British clubs that offer higher earning potential. The NWSL imposes base salary caps, which are negotiated through collective bargaining by league officials and the NWSL Players Association. The base cap for the 2025 season was set at $3.3 million per team, and rose to $3.5 million for the 2026 season.

Rodman’s deal was made possible by a new payment structure, dubbed the High Impact Player Rule, that the NWSL introduced — over the union’s objections — one week before her contract with the Spirit was slated to expire Dec. 31. 

The rule is “designed to provide clubs with expanded flexibility to attract and retain high impact players,” the league said in a news release late last year. It allows clubs to exceed the league’s established salary cap by up to $1 million to sign high-impact players, a status determined by on- and off-field criteria including minutes played and annual player rankings. 

Though the rule does not take effect until July 1, clubs can start signing players to deals financed by the mechanism now. Rodman’s deal is the first signed under the new mechanism.

“I’ve made the DMV my home and the Spirit my family, and I knew this was where I wanted to enter the next chapter of my career,” Rodman said in a statement. “I’m proud of what we’ve built since my rookie season, and I’m excited about where this club is headed. We’re chasing championships and raising the standard, and I can’t wait to keep doing that with my teammates and the best fans in the NWSL.”

The high impact rule, and Rodman’s deal, did not come without controversy. The union filed a formal grievance challenging the rule last week, alleging it violates the league’s collective bargaining agreement and federal labor law. The union also took issue with the player qualification benchmarks set forward by the league. 

“The criteria themselves are flawed and problematic, and that is part of the basis of the grievance we filed,” Meghann Burke, executive director of the NWSL Players Association, said last week. “We think the GMs and the business leaders at these teams are best positioned to make these judgment calls and then assess fair market value.” 

NWSL Commissioner Jessica Berman said the rule was created to ensure American clubs “can compete for the best players in the world,” adding it’s “critical to the continued growth of our league.”

“The High Impact Player Rule allows teams to invest strategically in top talent, strengthens our ability to retain star players, and demonstrates our commitment to building world-class rosters for fans across the league,” Berman said.