We knew going into this WNBA season that the league's collective bargaining negotiations with the players would be one of the most important issues in 2025. With no deal in place ahead of the current collective bargaining agreement expiring on Oct. 31, it has become the single most important topic.
During WNBA All-Star Weekend in mid-July, the players put the focus squarely on the CBA. Players described a meeting with commissioner Cathy Engelbert and ownership representative in Indianapolis as being "a missed opportunity" to come closer on terms.
Before the July 19 All-Star Game, players wore "Pay Us What You Owe Us" T-shirts during warmups. Fans chanted in support of the players after the game, but the move got some criticism, too.
Even retired WNBA legend Candace Parker said during her "Post Moves" podcast with the Indiana Fever's Aliyah Boston that it wasn't a great look for the players to wear those shirts and then give little to no effort during the game. Boston countered by saying that with so many games on the schedule and short recovery times, the players didn't need to play hard in an exhibition because they are giving so much in the games that matter.
Meanwhile, Engelbert has stayed on message with mostly positive platitudes, guiding a management/ownership response -- or lack thereof -- that isn't focused on public perception.
Will the sides move closer over the next few months? ESPN looks at what we've learned to this point about the CBA negotiations and what could come from them.
What are the players' biggest priorities?
There are several, but the most important is revenue sharing: how it's determined and whether the percentage will be allowed to grow during the course of the CBA and not be a fixed number for the duration of the deal.
"The players are still adamant that we get a percentage of revenue that grows with the business, which perhaps includes team revenue, and that's just a part of the conversation," WNBA Players Association president Nneka Ogwumike told ESPN.
Fans are used to salary caps for NBA and NFL teams being set based on a percentage of what the CBA describes as "basketball-related income," or BRI. By contrast, the WNBA's current CBA defined the cap for each season ahead of time with modest 3% annual raises. A mechanism in the CBA that would increase the cap based on revenue was effectively invalidated by the timing of the deal.
Because the current CBA began in 2020 prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, revenue targets were set based on the previous campaign (2019) and made cumulative over the life of the deal. The league made no money off ticket sales during the abbreviated 2020 season, played on the IMG Academy campus in Bradenton, Florida, and attendance was also limited in 2021 by local restrictions. That made it unrealistic for the targets to be met despite the league's increased attendance over the last two seasons.
Per Ogwumike, the WNBA's latest offer to its players -- while dramatically increasing the salary cap and maximum base salaries, which a league source suggested could quadruple to at least $1 million from their current $249,244 -- follows the same model as the current CBA.
"It's basically the same system that we exist in right now," Ogwumike said. "They're proposing a system that includes revenue that would grow with the business. When you approach it from the perspective of their response to our proposal, yes, money is more, but ultimately if you look at the growth of the business, the money relative to the percentage of everything is virtually staying the same."
The players see the astonishing leap in franchise valuations -- the Las Vegas Aces, for example, were purchased for $2 million in 2021 but are now valued at $310 million, and the New York Liberty were purchased for $10-14 million after being for sale for more than a year and now have an estimated valuation of around $450 million -- in the past couple of years and question if they are getting their proper share of that growth.
On its face, that's a reasonable thing to ask. But what about the NBA's claims for years of subsidizing WNBA losses? Will the NBA say the new money is in part back-filling past deficits? Could it prove that?
One of the most difficult parts of following the WNBA's labor negotiations all these years has been getting firm numbers from the league's side of things. The players have said they don't always feel like they get that. By the same token, the side we do hear much more from -- during every CBA -- is the players and their union. There has been dramatic change in the WNBA -- and what that indicates for the future -- in a short period of time after many years that seemed stagnant. The popularity of 2024 No. 1 draft pick Caitlin Clark has been an enormous boost for a league that had clearly started to turn the corner toward real growth over the past five years.
If that growth continues as expected, it's understandable the players are concerned about how their part of the pie grows, too.
"We're seeing expansion, and the players are just saying, 'Hey, let us have our fair share of that,'" Ogwumike said. "Sometimes that means proposing something new that makes sense for the time. Not really new -- new to us, not to other leagues."
How realistic is a lockout? What about the WNBA missing games in 2026?
Much of the attention around CBA negotiations has inevitably focused on the potential of a work stoppage, something that would be unprecedented in WNBA history. The players' disappointment with the outcome of their meeting at the All-Star break fanned the flames on the possibility.
Ideally, a new deal would be reached before the Oct. 31 expiration of the CBA, allowing the offseason to proceed as scheduled. There's precedent for that. The NBA's last two CBA negotiations have been completed during the previous season, well before the deadline, and the NWSL and its players replaced their CBA with a historic new one signed in 2024 with two years remaining on their previous deal.
Failing to reach agreement by Halloween wouldn't necessarily translate into a lockout. With talks progressing, the two sides extended the term of the last CBA until they completed negotiations in January on the eve of free agency.
The WNBA might have more urgency this year because of the expansion process for the Portland Fire and Toronto Tempo, set to begin play in 2026 (and expansion to 18 teams by 2030). Last year's Golden State Valkyries expansion draft was held Dec. 7, giving the team time to prepare for free agency and players to promote their inaugural season.
Although an offseason lockout would be disruptive, most notably by preventing players from utilizing team facilities to work out -- something that's more of an issue now than in 2020 with multiple teams building dedicated practice facilities that are available to players year-round -- when fans think about a work stoppage, their real concern is missing games. That's not in anyone's best interest.
Specifically, owners have more at stake now that franchise valuations have escalated. Most explicitly in 2003, when negotiations on the WNBA's second CBA took until April to complete, players have always had to deal with the possibility that owners could withdraw their support for the league.
With fierce competition for expansion teams, the WNBA is no longer at risk of going anywhere. That's increased player resolve to make a deal on their terms -- however long that means.
"The headline is 'lockout!' and ultimately the goal for everyone is to get a good deal done," Ogwumike said. "Hopefully it gets done in the time that makes sense. I don't think anyone wants to see a lockout. That's not something that we're advocating for. We just want to make sure that this is a deal that's done the right way and using whatever time it takes for us to be able to have both sides agree on something."
How big of an issue is prioritization this time?
This was a must-have for owners in the last CBA negotiations, so it will be important again. They want the players to prioritize playing in the WNBA above overseas leagues and newer ventures like Unrivaled, the U.S.-based 3-on-3 league that played its first season in February and March.
The Minnesota Lynx's Napheesa Collier and New York Liberty's Breanna Stewart co-founded Unrivaled and are also on the WNBPA's executive committee. Both insist this doesn't constitute a conflict of interest with them also participating in CBA negotiations, but it's difficult to see how that could be entirely avoided.
For instance, Collier wore an Unrivaled shirt during the televised WNBA All-Star Game roster draft, for which she was a captain. Of the move, Collier told ESPN, "I thought it was a great opportunity to represent something I was passionate about."
Seattle Storm player Gabby Williams was outspoken during All-Star Weekend that she thinks the WNBA wants to see the end of Unrivaled and another U.S.-based league, Athletes Unlimited, even if they aren't direct competitors with the WNBA's summertime schedule. The WNBA hasn't said that. But the owners have been willing to put more pressure on the players since the last CBA to affirm their loyalty to the WNBA.
There are some exceptions for prioritization -- including for younger players establishing themselves overseas and for those competing for national teams -- that could stay in place. But the owners say that the WNBA holding firm on prioritization brings more respect to the league, and that it has prompted some scheduling concessions from overseas leagues and FIBA events to not conflict with the WNBA season when possible. Starting in 2030, for example, the FIBA Women's Basketball World Cup will move from September-October to November-December.
Ogwumike is encouraged by the state of conversations but notes that the two sides haven't yet drilled down on non-financial terms.
"I don't think that we've served enough time discussing a lot of the other details because this is really kind of what we need to get going to move forward with everything else," she said. "It's been quite receptive to our proposal and their response in terms of, you know, seeing things that we want to change and perhaps them even proposing different things when it comes to season footprint and number of games. As we see the expansion of these teams, we're going to be playing more teams.
"Right now, we're prioritizing salary and salary systems."
What is something we would like to see added to the CBA?
As we mentioned earlier this year, the rules for draft eligibility might need to be updated and simplified. In the current system, college seniors and juniors who turn 22 in the year of the draft (or are set to graduate within three months of the draft) can declare. Meanwhile, international players who don't play in the United States college system are first eligible for the draft in the year they turn 20.
Perhaps the WNBA could consider having similar rules to MLB and college baseball, where players are draft-eligible after their junior season or when they turn 21, whichever comes first.
"That's come up in conversations ... exploring what the age limit can be," Ogwumike said earlier this year.
