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Satou Sabally, a Mercury star and Women’s National Basketball Players Association representative, didn’t mince words.
Negotiations with the WNBA hit an early roadblock when the union rejected the league’s first collective bargaining agreement offer sent recently, according to Front Office Sports, and Sabally called it a “slap in the face” when addressing reporters Tuesday.
“I love to see the league growing,” Sabally said one day after the league announced it’ll expand to 18 teams by 2030. “… But how cool would it also be to have a little bit of expansion on the rosters? Let’s focus on the teams that have everything set up right now.”
The WNBPA opted out of its current CBA in October, essentially setting up a scenario where 2025 would be the last year on the current iteration, and a work stoppage could follow without a new agreement once it expires after the campaign.
So negotiations have served as the backdrop to everything that transpires during games this season, with players such as the Fever’s Sydney Colson using an interview to leverage the union’s thoughts and Caitlin Clark calling out — in the aftermath of Indiana’s Commissioner’s Cup title earlier this week — the discrepancy in pay between winning the in-season tournament and the postseason one.
The first proposal wasn’t seen as “entirely responsive” to the union’s stance, according to Front Office Sports, which cited an anonymous source.
WNBPA president Nneka Ogwumike told The Post’s Madeline Kenney on June 22 that negotiations were “on track” and added that the union wants to have a “productive” in-person meeting at All-Star Weekend later this month.
But as Liberty star Breanna Stewart said, challenges exist when attempting to negotiate during a season.
“I think the hardest things are like finding time,” Stewart said on May 15. “Time for the calls, because it’s like everyone’s got a different schedule. Everyone’s got personal things going on. But it shows how important it is, and that’s really why everyone’s — we’re able to make time. We’re able to make sure that we’re gonna not leave anything on the table in terms of when we’re talking about what we want.”
A new 11-year media rights deal worth $2.2 billion will start next year, and seismic roster shifts could happen this offseason with plenty of players — intentionally — set to hit free agency with the hope of capitalizing on an expected increase in salaries.
The WNBA announced that Cleveland, Detroit and Philadelphia will all add teams by 2030, joining Golden State (this year), Portland (2026) and Toronto (2026) as other cities to receive expansion teams.
WNBA commissioner Cathy Engelbert told reporters earlier this week that she didn’t want CBA negotiations to interfere with the league’s plan to scale, calling it the “right moment” for growth, according to Sportico.
But that doesn’t mean the WNBPA agrees with how those negotiations have unfolded in the meantime.
