Fever Star Sophie Cunningham’s ‘Next Team’ Remark Turns Heads Before WNBA Free Agency
The next few months are perhaps the most important in the history of women's basketball.
This is owed to the ongoing negotiations between the WNBA players and the league office regarding the next Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA), which will shape several crucial aspects of the league (and women's basketball as a whole), most notably how much players will be able to get paid.
Assuming the new CBA gets agreed to and instituted before the start of 2026, this will spark an absolute frenzy when it comes to free agency. Every single WNBA veteran except two players is becoming an unrestricted free agent this winter because they wanted to capitalize on the CBA's new salary permissions. Therefore, the league's landscape is sure to shift drastically, given that so many players will be on the move to new franchises.
The one team that has the clearest picture of how their roster will look next season is the Indiana Fever, given that both Aliyah Boston and Caitlin Clark are still on their rookie contracts and therefore won't be going anywhere this winter. Outside of that, the Fever's roster could be looking a lot different in 2026.
While it feels like every Fever player has expressed or indicated that they'll at least be open to returning to the team next season, Indiana's front office will still need to offer these players what they're worth salary-wise in order to entice them to return instead of joining another WNBA team.
Sophie Cunningham Gets Honest About Next Contract Desire
Beloved Fever player Sophie Cunningham is already clear about what she's seeking in terms of her next WNBA contract, which she conveyed during an October 31 episode of her Show Me Something podcast.
"I think the next team I play for, I want a bigger contract. So then I can buy a house and be homey and cozy," Cunningham said.
Sophie Cunningham just said on her podcast she is looking for a bigger multi year contract so she can buy a house. Take care of your fellow Missouri girl @AmberLCox and make our fan favorite Sophie a Fever for life by paying her what she is worth. We can’t lose her. pic.twitter.com/969Cbnt3ge
— CaitlinFor3 (@CaitlinForThree) October 31, 2025
This comment has caught a lot of attention, and Fever fans on social media are using it to tell the front office to give Cunningham what she wants so that she can remain with the team for the foreseeable future.
While anything can happen, Cunningham has expressed her interest in returning to Indiana several times in the past. If they do offer her a "bigger contract", one would imagine that Cunningham will happily accept and start shopping for houses in and around Indianapolis over the next couple of months.
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Grant Young covers Women’s Basketball, the Indiana Fever and the New York Mets for Sports Illustrated’s ‘On SI’ sites. He holds an MFA degree in creative writing from the University of San Francisco (USF), where he also graduated with a Bachelor’s Degree in Marketing and played on USF’s Division I baseball team for five years. However, he now prefers Angel Reese to Angels in the Outfield.
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