When Angel City FC was introduced to the National Women’s Soccer League in the summer of 2020, the greatest amount of attention was paid not to which players might become a part of the squad but rather to the long list of entertainment superstars announced as club founders or investors, including Natalie Portman, Jessica Chastain, Uzo Aduba, Eva Longoria and Christina Aguilera. Whether or not they’d win any titles, they were a clear threat to win you some Oscars, Emmys or Grammys.
It was compelling to see so many prominent figures — and so many of them women — helping to establish a Los Angeles entry in the nation’s top women’s league. For an expansion fee of just $2 million, though, they didn’t have a lot to lose. Literally.
Just a few years later, whether or not you’re a movie star, you no longer can buy a chunk of an NWSL expansion team with the spare change in your couch cushions and piggy bank. The group behind Bay FC, the Northern California team that will take the field for the first time in the 2024 season, had to dish out $53 million for a spot in the league.
That’s a 2,550 percent increase in three years, which seems to follow the worldwide growth chart of women’s soccer in the decade of the ‘20s.
This FIFA Women’s World Cup set an attendance…
