SEATTLE — Early in Rose Lavelle’s career, the star midfielder couldn’t help but sometimes question spectators’ motivations.

Were they coming to watch her play because they loved soccer and appreciated the beautiful game? Or was it out of pity?

“I don’t know exactly how to say this without it sounding bad, but for so long, sometimes it felt like charity,” Lavelle told USA TODAY Sports. “It was like, ‘Oh, watch women’s soccer. They deserve it. Please do it for these amazing people.’

“I know it’s coming from a good place, but I don’t want you to watch me because you feel bad for me. I want you to watch me because the game is sick, the product is sick, the players are amazing. I feel like that’s where it is now. The fan base is growing because they love watching the product.”

No kidding.

Ahead of the 2023 World Cup, where the U.S. Women's National Team is favored to win a third consecutive title, women’s sports are exploding in popularity across the globe — and as a result, money is exploding, too.

To wit: TV ratings for nearly every major women’s event are up considerably, from the NCAA basketball Final Four and softball's Women’s College World Series to NWSL and WNBA games. Sellouts of women’s games are becoming increasingly common. New TV contracts are set to be negotiated in the coming years with various NCAA championships — A recent study commissioned by the NCAA showed women’s March Madness alone could be sold for as much as $100 million a year — and the WNBA, which is likely to flood women’s teams and leagues with cash.

World Trade Organization Director-General Okonjo-Iweala said in May the 2023 World Cup is projected to generate $220 billion. And though a host country for the 2027 World Cup has yet to be determined, TV rights are expected to spark a hotly contested battle between numerous networks.

“Resources are pouring into the women’s game," said Crystal Dunn, a defender with the USWNT and midfielder with the NWSL's Portland Thorns. "I think there’s a massive amount of investment. That’s where I think the biggest growth is coming, just people actually putting money behind (women’s sports).”

Advocates say the growth is long overdue and it’s been made clear to both wealthy individuals and companies that investing in women’s sports now shouldn’t happen because it’s the right thing to do, but because it can make money. Boatloads of it.

“One thing people in charge aren’t going to admit, even though it’s true, is that they’ve been leaving a lot of money on the table for a long time,” Ellen Staurowsky, a professor of sports media at Ithaca College, told USA TODAY Sports. “There has been decades of neglect … part of that is because it was men in positions of power who were leveraging and exploiting these female athletes — but also, they weren’t seeing the actual value women brought to the table.”

Having more women, including former athletes, in prominent leadership roles has changed that, Staurowsky added, making it “abundantly clear” women’s sports can and should be sold as a separate, and profitable, entity.

The athletes themselves deciding they’re sick of being treated as second-class citizens plays a role too, according to Staurowsky. She cited the historic lawsuit the USWNT filed against its federation for equal pay as an example. Not only did the American women win, but their fight inspired numerous other women’s national teams across the world to stand up to their organizations, too.

“Women athletes are saying, ‘We are here, we are accomplished, we know what we’re about and what we’re worth — and we’re gonna create good trouble when you don’t treat us well,’” Staurowsky said. “That’s resonating with consumers, and these women are being seen as marketable because of it.”

'The richest, deepest' untapped resource

The easiest and most obvious way to see the growth of women’s sports: Study the numbers.

While numerous men’s teams, both college and professional, have struggled to bring fans back in the same pre-COVID numbers, attendance for women’s leagues and teams is skyrocketing.

In June, data from TeamWork Online showed both the NWSL and WNBA outperforming all men’s pro leagues when it came to attendance growth. The NWSL, for example, increased game attendance by 48% compared to last year. In the first half of the 2023 WNBA season, ESPN games jumped 46% in viewership. Less than 40 days from kickoff of the World Cup, Sportico reported 90% of all available ads on FOX Sports had already been sold, significantly outpacing ad sales just four years ago.

In winter 2022, as numerous college athletic departments prepared to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Title IX, then-Women's Basketball Coaches Association president and UCLA women’s basketball coach Cori Close told USA TODAY Sports that if schools wanted to increase revenue amid declining attendance at football games, they needed to take a hard look at how much they were investing in their women’s programs.

“We’ve been relying forever on men’s basketball and football to make money, from TV rights to corporate sponsorship to ticket sales and everything in between — and most schools are tapping out,” Close said. “It’s not about slicing the pie differently, it’s about letting women contribute so we can make the pie bigger. We need to invest in women because it’s a good business decision.”

In May, just one month after the NWSL announced that a Bay Area team would start play next season, NWSL commissioner Jessica Berman said by 2026, the league would expand to 16 teams from its current 12.

Elsewhere, Utah is bringing back its franchise, and Boston reportedly will return to the NWSL as its 15th franchise after the Boston Breakers folded in 2018. One week before the World Cup kicked off, a Denver investment group announced its plans to bring professional women’s soccer to the city, too. The group plans to host World Cup viewing parties to help build excitement. The NWSL’s commitment to adding more teams faster than originally anticipated put public pressure on WNBA commissioner Cathy Engelbert to expand, too.

Even kids are recognizing that women’s sports are the next wave to catch: At its press conference announcing its name and logo, Bay Area FC shared a story of an 11-year-old girl who sent the investor group, headlined by former USWNT standouts Brandi Chastain and Aly Wagner, a business plan to launch an official Bay Area FC fan club.

Chastain, whose celebration after scoring the winning penalty kick at the 1999 World Cup became one of the most iconic images in the history of sports, understands why Lavelle feels the way she does about supporting women sometimes feeling like charity. But flipping that narrative on its head is part of why she and Wagner were so passionate about bringing pro soccer back to the Bay.

“I think going back to the first league we ever had in the U.S., we always believed the product was good,” Chastain said. “We just didn’t have the experience in building a business around women’s sports. What we have today is much different and much more robust.”

Women athletes, she said, have been “yelling it from the mountain tops for years — we are the richest, deepest resource that has been untapped.”

Not a 'traditional' sports product

When Jessica Smith was nearly laughed out of an NWSL CBO meeting three years ago, she didn’t flinch. She also didn’t take it personally. She just smiled, because the Head of Revenue at Angel City FC knew she was right.

What prompted the laugher? Asked what she’d been working on, Smith shared that she was currently focused on selling the front of ACFC’s jersey, arguably the single most important sale she would make, because jersey sponsorship typically makes up 40-50% of total sponsorship revenue with soccer clubs. When she told other NWSL front office executives she anticipated being in the market for “a healthy seven-figure sponsorship, over $2 million,” the room burst into laughter.

A month later, she came back and told them it was done — and oh, by the way, she’d also sold the sleeve and back of jersey, too.

“That was very validating,” Smith told USA TODAY Sports. “From a business perspective, that showcased what was possible. Now there are some teams selling even more than we are.”

Fifteen years working in men’s pro sports gave Smith a different outlook when she moved over to the NWSL. One thing she noticed immediately: Sometimes it’s the women who work in women’s sports who hold themselves back.

“I don’t think it’s ever been done with ill intent,” she said. “It's just these systems that have existed to help brands, media companies, agencies and teams understand what they’re worth … were built around men’s teams. No one has ever questioned, why are we doing it this way, why isn’t (a women’s team) worth more?

“For so long, women’s sports were approached as, ‘how do we not lose money?’ as opposed to, ‘how do we make money?’ There was an attitude of, ‘if we lose even $7 it’s terrible!’ That is so backward."

Women’s sports, Smith stressed, are not a traditional sports product — and that’s OK.

“We’re a mix of sport, purpose, pop culture,” she said. “We have many people attend games who wouldn’t identify themselves as a sports fan; they’re an Angel City fan, but you couldn’t get them at an NBA game.”

The better everyone in revenue understands those demographics, the more money women’s teams will be allowed to ask for — and expect.

Angel City expansion a blueprint for others

Angel City, whose ownership group includes Oscar-winning actress Natalie Portman, is considered the gold standard in women’s sports expansion. A recent three-part HBO docuseries showcased how the club went from cute startup to a valuation of more than $100 million in a matter of months — before ACFC had played a game or signed a player.

It’s a blueprint other clubs and investors want to follow, especially because the World Cup is likely to give women’s soccer, and women’s sports as a whole, another boost in popularity. And that’s fitting, Smith said, because for so many, what’s happening right now started back in ’99 with that memorable Chastain moment.

“That team was pivotal to me and so many of my peers, it’s the reason so many of us got into the sports industry. We saw ourselves in them,” she said. “Obviously it’s been a slow burn since, but each World Cup cycle, it comes back with a vengeance. And I do think that global moment, and the attention that team has consistently brought over the last 20-plus years, has set the tone for what you’re seeing today.”

Or, as Lavelle explained it with a laugh and roll of her eyes: “They’re not just going now because ‘Ohm that’s a cool thing for women.’”

Now investors and companies are in it for themselves and their own interests. They want to make money, lots of it, and they see women’s sports as an avenue to do so.

And that logic is just fine with Lavelle.

Follow Lindsay Schnell on Twitter: @Lindsay_Schnell

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: 2023 World Cup comes as interest, investment in women's sports soars