NEW YORK (AP) — The WNBA and the players union will meet for the fifth straight day Saturday having a sense of urgency to get a deal done by Monday to avoid disruptions to the upcoming season.
Both sides said Friday night that movement is being made toward a new CBA that would be transformational. They have spent approximately 50 hours discussing a new CBA since first getting together in person on Tuesday — the day the league had originally said there
would need to be at least a handshake agreement for the season to start on time.
WNBA Commissioner Cathy Engelbert said Friday night that they need to get a deal done by Monday to avoid disruptions to the upcoming season.
“I’ve never been a betting woman in my life and I’m not going to start now, but we have to get a deal by Monday,” Engelbert told reporters. “I should say we have to get it done without disrupting some part of the fact that we’ve got to run this two-team expansion (draft). We have to get expansion going. We have to get free agency going. We got to get the college draft, which is now a month from today.”
The league's first two preseason games are on April 25 with Caitlin Clark and Indiana visiting New York and Seattle playing Golden State.
“We have a fairly short preseason,” Engelbert said. “We have preseason games scheduled on April 25. That’s what I first worry about. Those are some great games.”
Before the preseason games even happen, there's a lot to do with an expansion draft for Portland and Toronto as well as free agency for 80% of the league. The college draft also needs to take place.
The past two days have been spent dealing with some of the more ancillary issues and not focusing on revenue sharing — which is the area where the two sides have the biggest differences.
“I think we must have reached agreement on some things,” union executive director Terri Carmichael Jackson said on other CBA items without offering specifics.
Revenue sharing will be the biggest hurdle to get over. While league proposals have always been using net revenue — revenue after expenses — and union ones have talked about gross revenue — revenue before expenses —Jackson feels they have been on similar pages.
“The continued conversations have helped us kind of chip away at what the concerns are for both sides and how we meet them, how we address them,” Jackson said on the current divide regarding the salary model.
The union started asking for 40% of gross revenue and had come down to 26% before the marathon in-person bargaining sessions. The league had been offering more than 70% net revenue for the players.
The two sides have exchanged 15 or so proposals over the first four days they've met in conversations that have lasted into the wee hours of the morning.
"It is meaningful to sit across the table and listen to their concerns, them to listen to our concerns or listen to why we think something that we’re bargaining over is where we want to be,” Engelbert said. “Some cases, they agree. Some cases, they don’t. We listen to the players when they talk about things, and they listen to us. So, you know, progress.”
Jackson and Engelbert both were involved in the previous CBA deal that was ratified in 2020. While the stakes are higher this time, the process is similar.
“Negotiations last time, that’s how we got it done. We just keep grinding and keep doing the work around the clock,” Jackson said.
She then later added that “we have been there committed round the clock and speaking very passionately and factually. As long as movement keeps us going in a forward direction, then I think we’re good.”
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