Fever's Cap Crunch Puts Clark's Raise Against Mitchell's Future

The Indiana Fever's offseason starts with a number that doesn't stretch. Under the new collective bargaining agreement, the 2027 salary cap could rise as much as 13 percent, to $7.91 million. Indiana already has $4.676 million of it spoken for across six players, which leaves roughly $3.234 million for five more contracts — and that's before the two decisions that define the franchise get made.

The first is Kelsey Mitchell. She's one of the top unrestricted free agents in the league, and under the CBA only her current team can offer her a supermax contract. If Indiana wants to keep her at the top of the market, it has to outbid everyone with the one contract nobody else can match — and then live with what that does to the rest of the sheet.

The second decision wears No. 22. Caitlin Clark is eligible for an EPIC extension, the mechanism that lets a team renegotiate a rookie contract in its fourth year for a player who's made All-WNBA — Clark was first-team in 2024 and again in 2026. If her deal isn't touched, she plays 2027 at $596,597, a star's production at a fraction of a star's price. If it is touched, the raise comes straight out of that $3.234 million pool.

Aliyah Boston's money is already locked in. She's on a supermax through 2029 and counts $1.582 million against the 2027 cap. Behind her sit Lexie Hull at $803,250, Monique Billings at $800,000, Makayla Timpson at $305,250, Raven Johnson at $300,698 and Damiris Dantas at $288,600. It's a solid spine. It just isn't a cheap one.

Billings is the quiet pressure point. Her $800,000 for 2027 becomes protected only if she isn't waived or re-signed by February 1, 2027, which gives the front office a date on the calendar where flexibility exists if it wants it. Every other dollar on the sheet is harder to move.

There's also new management reading the spreadsheet. Indiana has a new team president and a new general manager, and their first winter together is a math problem with two fan favorites on opposite sides of it. Pay Mitchell the supermax and Clark's raise squeezes the bench. Extend Clark first and Mitchell's price becomes the squeeze instead.

None of this is a crisis. It's what success costs under a hard cap that's still catching up to the league's growth. But the Fever don't get to keep everyone at full price, and the order they make these calls in will tell the rest of the league exactly what they think their window looks like.