NWSL Rewrites Controversial High Impact Player Rule
The NWSL’s most controversial roster rule is being rewritten – and this time, the players won.
In a sweeping settlement announced Friday, the NWSL and the NWSL Players Association agreed to strip away the restrictive criteria around the High Impact Player (HIP) designation, opening the door for any player in the league to earn its top salaries rather than a pre-selected elite.
What began as a mechanism to keep stars from bolting to Europe had turned into a flashpoint over power, pay and who gets to define “star” in a league that insists it is growing up.
From “Rodman Rule” to open market
The HIP rule arrived late last year with a clear intent: give clubs an extra $1m to spend above the salary cap to retain or attract marquee talent. On paper, it was aggressive. For the 2026 season, that meant teams could go $1m beyond a $3.7m cap.
But the fine print lit the fuse.
To qualify as a High Impact Player, an athlete had to tick at least one of eight boxes. US national team minutes. Ballon d’Or recognition. NWSL Best XI honors. Inclusion on certain media lists, including the Guardian’s Top 100 and a ranking of athletes by marketability. Roughly 100 players fit the bill at the time.
The list included names such as Trinity Rodman and Sophia Wilson. It did not automatically capture others who define the league’s standard on the pitch, like two-time NWSL MVP Sam Kerr or US forward Catarina Macario. The message, intentional or not, was jarring: some of the league’s biggest game-changers didn’t meet its own definition of “high impact.”
The NWSLPA pushed back hard. The union filed a grievance, arguing the classification system violated federal labor law and the collective bargaining agreement. The battle lines were clear: players wanted money to follow performance and club valuation, not an external checklist or a media ranking.
Now, those criteria are gone.
Starting 1 January 2027, clubs will be free to designate any player as a High Impact Player, provided that player’s salary reaches at least 12% of the base salary cap. The league retains the right to cap how many HIPs each club can carry, but the gatekeeping around who is “eligible” has been dismantled.
It’s still a mechanism. It’s no longer a caste system.
A settlement with real teeth
The HIP overhaul was only part of a broader agreement. In all, six grievances were resolved between the league and the union.
One of the most significant centered on the Washington Spirit’s attempted contract with Rodman, a saga that helped turn the HIP rule into what many around the league quietly called the “Rodman Rule.”
Last November, before the HIP mechanism existed, the Spirit tried to lock in their star forward on a deal averaging more than $1m per year. The structure was backloaded, and NWSL commissioner Jessica Berman stepped in, blocking the contract as a violation of league rules. The NWSLPA responded with a grievance, calling the move a “flagrant violation” of player free agency rights.
Weeks later, the league unveiled the HIP rule. The optics were impossible to ignore. A star player’s mega-deal gets denied, then a special mechanism appears that would, in theory, govern exactly those kinds of contracts.
Rodman eventually re-signed with the Spirit in January on a record deal worth more than $2m annually, using the new mechanism. But the grievance over the original blocked contract stayed alive – and now forms part of the settlement.
The agreement doesn’t strip the league of its power to police the cap. The NWSL will still be able to reject contracts it believes are designed to circumvent salary rules. The change is in the process. The league must now notify the union within 72 hours of any such rejection and provide an explanation. No more black box.
On top of that, the league will be required to provide regular salary cap and revenue updates to its clubs throughout the year. Transparency, long a sticking point in a league that has grown faster than its systems, is no longer optional.
NWSLPA director Meghann Burke called the deal “evidence of the NWSLPA’s strength and commitment to enforcing the terms of the Collective Bargaining Agreement,” speaking to ESPN, which first reported the settlement. From the league side, executive vice-president Bill Ordower framed the agreement as part of a “mature labor relationship” and stressed that it protects “integrity and competitive balance.”
The rhetoric reflects what the document does: it doesn’t blow up the league’s structure, but it forces it into the open.
Who gets paid now?
The immediate headline is philosophical: any player can now be a High Impact Player if a club values them that way and pays accordingly. The implications are financial and competitive.
Previously, the HIP criteria effectively created an approved list of potential big earners, even if the league never published it in full. Players like Denver’s Lindsey Heaps, Orlando’s Barbra Banda and Gotham’s Rose Lavelle fit the profile of those who could be signed or re-signed via the mechanism. Several such deals have already been done, though clubs are not required to disclose which contracts use HIP slots.
From 2027, the conversation changes. Clubs will have more latitude to invest heavily in a center-back, a goalkeeper, a rising youngster without a national team résumé, or a veteran who never caught the eye of a Ballon d’Or voter but anchors a locker room. The market, not a checklist, will decide.
The league still controls the number of HIP designations per team and the overall cap environment. But in a global landscape where European clubs can spend without salary caps, NWSL sides now have a cleaner, less politicized tool to fight back for talent.
The pressure that once built around the “Rodman Rule” has been redirected into something closer to a genuine elite salary tier.
Boots, brands and another quiet win
The settlement didn’t stop at contracts and caps. It also tackled a smaller but telling battleground: what players wear on their feet.
Throughout this season, some players received warnings and fines for wearing cleats from brands that were not official league sponsors. For athletes with long-standing personal endorsement deals, the policy cut directly into both income and autonomy.
That, too, is changing. Under the new agreement, the NWSL will honor pre-existing endorsement deals for most players and withdraw previous fines tied to those non-sponsor boots.
It’s not the headline item, but it sends a clear signal. In a league that has long asked players to sacrifice for the bigger picture, the balance is edging back toward individual rights.
A league growing into its power era
The NWSL’s first version of the HIP rule was born out of anxiety: a wave of top players leaving for Europe, a salary cap that looked increasingly outdated in a global market, and owners desperate to keep pace. The mechanism was bold in spending power but narrow in who could benefit.
This settlement doesn’t erase that history. It rewrites the next chapter.
The league keeps its cap. Clubs keep an extra $1m to spend on stars. But the question of who qualifies as “high impact” now sits where it probably always belonged – with the teams willing to pay and the players willing to bet on their value.
In a sport where control over careers has so often rested with the league office, that shift may prove the most high-impact change of all.
