Fever have a $1.4 million Caitlin Clark, Kelsey Mitchell, Aliyah Boston problem

The Indiana Fever have three All-Star players, two of whom were selected to All-WNBA teams in 2025.

The problem that might create is that Indiana can't pay them all.

The WNBA's new collective bargaining agreement, which is still pending formalization by the league's Board of Governors, will raise the salary cap to $7 million per team, a significant increase that will pave the way for historic pay hikes for all players.

That includes the league's elite, like Aliyah Boston, Caitlin Clark and Kelsey Mitchell, who all are eligible to sign supermax contracts as soon as this year.

MORE: How new CBA impacts WNBA's highest salaries, from Kelsey Mitchell and A'ja Wilson to Caitlin Clark

Mitchell, a pending free agent who holds the Fever's single-season points per game record, is eligible to sign a supermax contract worth $1.4 million per year after she was selected to the All-WNBA first team in 2025.

Boston, a three-time All-Star across three WNBA seasons, is in the last year of her rookie-scale contract and will be getting a pay raise anyway, with the league's new average salary set to fall around $600,000.

Clark, though, is not eligible to sign a supermax until 2027, when she enters the fourth and final year of her rookie contract. And she has something to prove in 2026, as she comes off an injury-plagued second season in The W.

If all three of these players earn the max, then Fever general manager Amber Cox will have precious few resources to fill out the roster in the next two years.

Boston or Mitchell could agree to take less than the supermax in order to maintain roster flexibility. But with salaries reaching unprecedented heights, the days of stars taking less may soon be at an end.

It creates an interesting conundrum for the Fever, who want Mitchell back at all costs while viewing Clark as a paradigm-altering superstar and understanding that Boston is one of the best all-around bigs in the league.

More WNBA news:

• Wild WNBA free agency predictions: Breanna Stewart to Fever, Sophie Cunningham to Aces and more
• Aces' A'ja Wilson's $1.4 million contract update signals new era in WNBA
• Why Caitlin Clark still won't make the WNBA's average salary under new CBA
• What is the WNBA's minimum salary? New CBA sees players clinch 10x increase since 2003