WNBA’s CBA negotiations: From rev sharing to potential lockout

We knew going into this WNBA season that the league’s collective bargaining negotiations with the gamers can be one of the necessary points in 2025. With no deal in place forward of the present collective bargaining settlement expiring on Oct. 31, it has change into the one most necessary matter.

Throughout WNBA All-Star Weekend in mid-July, the gamers put the main target squarely on the CBA. Gamers described a gathering with commissioner Cathy Engelbert and possession consultant in Indianapolis as being “a missed alternative” to come back nearer on phrases.

Earlier than the July 19 All-Star Recreation, gamers wore “Pay Us What You Owe Us” T-shirts throughout warmups. Followers chanted in assist of the gamers after the sport, however the transfer acquired some criticism, too.

Even retired WNBA legend Candace Parker stated throughout her “Publish Strikes” podcast with the Indiana Fever‘s Aliyah Boston that it wasn’t an amazing search for the gamers to put on these shirts after which give little to no effort throughout the sport. Boston countered by saying that with so many video games on the schedule and brief restoration occasions, the gamers did not have to play laborious in an exhibition as a result of they’re giving a lot within the video games that matter.

In the meantime, Engelbert has stayed on message with largely optimistic platitudes, guiding a administration/possession response — or lack thereof — that is not targeted on public notion.

Will the edges transfer nearer over the following few months? ESPN appears to be like at what we have discovered thus far concerning the CBA negotiations and what may come from them.

What are the gamers’ greatest priorities?

There are a number of, however an important is income sharing: the way it’s decided and whether or not the share will probably be allowed to develop throughout the course of the CBA and never be a set quantity throughout the deal.

“The gamers are nonetheless adamant that we get a proportion of income that grows with the enterprise, which maybe contains staff income, and that is simply part of the dialog,” WNBA Gamers Affiliation president Nneka Ogwumike instructed ESPN.

Followers are used to wage caps for NBA and NFL groups being set based mostly on a proportion of what the CBA describes as “basketball-related earnings,” or BRI. Against this, the WNBA’s present CBA outlined the cap for every season forward of time with modest 3% annual raises. A mechanism within the CBA that may enhance the cap based mostly on income was successfully invalidated by the timing of the deal.

As a result of the present CBA started in 2020 previous to the COVID-19 pandemic, income targets have been set based mostly on the earlier marketing campaign (2019) and made cumulative over the lifetime of the deal. The league made no cash off ticket gross sales throughout the abbreviated 2020 season, performed on the IMG Academy campus in Bradenton, Florida, and attendance was additionally restricted in 2021 by native restrictions. That made it unrealistic for the targets to be met regardless of the league’s elevated attendance over the previous two seasons.

Per Ogwumike, the WNBA’s ad click rate supply to its gamers — whereas dramatically rising the wage cap and most base salaries, which a league supply steered may quadruple to at the very least $1 million from their present $249,244 — follows the identical mannequin as the present CBA.

“It is mainly the identical system that we exist in proper now,” Ogwumike stated. “They’re proposing a system that features income that may develop with the enterprise. If you method it from the angle of their response to our proposal, sure, cash is extra, however in the end should you have a look at the expansion of the enterprise, the cash relative to the share of all the pieces is nearly staying the identical.”

The gamers see the astonishing leap in franchise valuations — the Las Vegas Aces, for instance, have been bought for $2 million in 2021 however are actually valued at $310 million, and the New York Liberty have been bought for between $10 million and $14 million after being on the market for greater than a yr and now have an estimated valuation of round $450 million — up to now couple of years and query if they’re getting their correct share of that development.

On its face, that is an inexpensive factor to ask. However what concerning the NBA’s claims for years of subsidizing WNBA losses? Will the NBA say the brand new cash is partly back-filling previous deficits? May it show that?

Some of the troublesome components of following the WNBA’s labor negotiations all these years has been getting agency numbers from the league’s facet of issues. The gamers have stated they do not at all times really feel like they get that. By the identical token, the facet we do hear far more from — throughout each CBA — is the gamers and their union. There was dramatic change within the WNBA — and what that signifies for the longer term — in a brief time frame after a few years that appeared stagnant. The recognition of 2024 No. 1 draft choose Caitlin Clark has been an infinite enhance for a league that had clearly began to show the nook towards actual development over the previous 5 years.

If that development continues as anticipated, it is comprehensible the gamers are involved about how their a part of the pie grows, too.

“We’re seeing growth, and the gamers are simply saying, ‘Hey, allow us to have our fair proportion of that,'” Ogwumike stated. “Typically meaning proposing one thing new that is sensible for the time. Not likely new — new to us, to not different leagues.”

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May the WNBA be headed in direction of a piece stoppage?

Alexa Philippou studies on the WNBA gamers’ push for income sharing within the new CBA proposal.

How reasonable is a lockout? What concerning the WNBA lacking video games in 2026?

A lot of the eye round CBA negotiations has inevitably targeted on the potential of a piece stoppage, one thing that may be unprecedented in WNBA historical past. The gamers’ disappointment with the end result of their assembly on the All-Star break fanned the flames on the chance.

Ideally, a brand new deal can be reached earlier than the Oct. 31 expiration of the CBA, permitting the offseason to proceed as scheduled. There’s precedent for that. The NBA’s final two CBA negotiations have been accomplished throughout the earlier season, properly earlier than the deadline, and the NWSL and its gamers changed their CBA with a historic new one signed in 2024 with two years remaining on their earlier deal.

Failing to achieve settlement by Halloween would not essentially translate right into a lockout. With talks progressing, the 2 sides prolonged the time period of the final CBA till they accomplished negotiations in January on the eve of free company.

The WNBA may need extra urgency this yr due to the growth course of for the Portland Fireplace and Toronto Tempo, set to start play in 2026 (and growth to 18 groups by 2030). Final yr’s Golden State Valkyries growth draft was held Dec. 7, giving the staff time to arrange without cost company and gamers to advertise their inaugural season.

Though an offseason lockout can be disruptive, most notably by stopping gamers from using staff amenities to work out — one thing that is extra of a difficulty now than in 2020 with a number of groups constructing devoted observe amenities which can be out there to gamers year-round — when followers take into consideration a piece stoppage, their actual concern is lacking video games. That is not in anybody’s finest curiosity.

Particularly, house owners have extra at stake now that franchise valuations have escalated. Most explicitly in 2003, when negotiations on the WNBA’s second CBA took till April to finish, gamers have at all times needed to take care of the chance that house owners may withdraw their assist for the league.

With fierce competitors for growth groups, the WNBA is not vulnerable to going wherever. That is elevated participant resolve to make a deal on their phrases — nonetheless lengthy meaning.

“The headline is ‘lockout!’ and in the end the purpose for everybody is to get an excellent deal carried out,” Ogwumike stated. “Hopefully it will get carried out within the time that is sensible. I do not assume anybody needs to see a lockout. That is not one thing that we’re advocating for. We simply need to guarantee that this can be a deal that is carried out the precise manner and utilizing no matter time it takes for us to have the ability to have each side agree on one thing.”

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WNBA stars put on ‘pay us what you owe us’ shirts

The WNBA All-Stars put on shirts that learn “Pay Us What You Owe Us” amid CBA talks with the league.

How huge of a difficulty is prioritization this time?

This was a must have for house owners within the final CBA negotiations, so it is going to be necessary once more. They need the gamers to prioritize taking part in within the WNBA above abroad leagues and newer ventures like Unequalled, the U.S.-based 3-on-3 league that performed its first season in February and March.

The Minnesota Lynx‘s Napheesa Collier and New York Liberty’s Breanna Stewart co-founded Unequalled and are additionally on the WNBPA’s government committee. Each insist this doesn’t constitute a conflict of interest with them additionally collaborating in CBA negotiations, however it’s troublesome to see how that might be fully prevented.

As an illustration, Collier wore an Unequalled shirt throughout the televised WNBA All-Star Recreation roster draft, for which she was a captain. Of the transfer, Collier told ESPN, “I believed it was an amazing alternative to signify one thing I used to be captivated with.”

Seattle Storm participant Gabby Williams was outspoken throughout All-Star Weekend that she thinks the WNBA needs to see the top of Unequalled and one other U.S.-based league, Athletes Limitless, even when they are not direct rivals with the WNBA’s summertime schedule. The WNBA hasn’t stated that. However the house owners have been keen to place extra strain on the gamers because the final CBA to affirm their loyalty to the WNBA.

There are some exceptions for prioritization — together with for youthful gamers establishing themselves abroad and for these competing for nationwide groups — that might keep in place. However the house owners say that the WNBA holding agency on prioritization brings extra respect to the league, and that it has prompted some scheduling concessions from abroad leagues and FIBA occasions to not battle with the WNBA season when attainable. Beginning in 2030, for instance, the FIBA Ladies’s Basketball World Cup will transfer from September-October to November-December.

Ogwumike is inspired by the state of conversations however notes that the 2 sides have not but drilled down on non-financial phrases.

“I do not assume that we have served sufficient time discussing loads of the opposite particulars as a result of that is actually sort of what we have to get going to maneuver ahead with all the pieces else,” she stated. “It has been fairly receptive to our proposal and their response by way of, you recognize, seeing issues that we need to change and maybe them even proposing various things in relation to season footprint and variety of video games. As we see the growth of those groups, we’ll be taking part in extra groups.

“Proper now, we’re prioritizing wage and wage programs.”

What’s one thing we wish to see added to the CBA?

As we talked about earlier this yr, the principles for draft eligibility would possibly have to be up to date and simplified. Within the present system, school seniors and juniors who flip 22 within the yr of the draft (or are set to graduate inside three months of the draft) can declare. In the meantime, worldwide gamers who do not play in america school system are first eligible for the draft within the yr they flip 20.

Maybe the WNBA may take into account having related guidelines to MLB and school baseball, the place gamers are draft-eligible after their junior season or once they flip 21, whichever comes first.

“That is come up in conversations … exploring what the age restrict might be,” Ogwumike stated earlier this yr.