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When speaking about the state of WNBA collective bargaining agreement (CBA) negotiations at Unrivaled’s Monday pre-semifinal press availability, Kelsey Plum and Breanna Stewart both struck a more conciliatory tone, emphasizing their opposition to a strike, the wins that the union has secured thus far and a desire to come to agreement that allows for a 2026 WNBA season.
On Tuesday, the pair, both of whom are members of the WNBPA’s executive committee, with Plum serving as the first vice president and Stewart a vice president, sent a three-page letter to WNBPA executive director Terri Carmichael Jackson that related their “serious concerns” with the union’s approach to CBA negotiations, according to reporting from ESPN’s Alexa Philippou and Don Van Natta Jr.
Per Philippou and Van Natta Jr., Plum and Stewart indicated in their letter to Jackson that “we do not feel like we have an adequate seat at the table negotiations,” and asked for “a changed dynamic between our PA administrators and the players.”
Philippou and Van Natta Jr. further reported:
It is unclear whether the rest of the seven-player executive committee agrees with Plum and Stewart’s sentiments on WNBPA leadership, or whether they were informed before the letter was sent. Sources have indicated that some members are content with the union’s handling of negotiations.
The other members of the WNBPA executive committee are: Nneka Ogwumike (president), Elizabeth Williams (secretary), Brianna Turner (treasurer), Alysha Clark (vice president) and Napheesa Collier (vice president).
On Tuesday evening, the union subsequently held their weekly call with players, in which the concerns expressed by Plum and Stewart were discussed. The call also served as an opportunity to relay the results of the survey sent to players last week.
Phillipou and Van Natta Jr. presented more details from Plum and Stewart’s letter, where the two outlined how they feel they “have not been meaningfully engaged” in CBA negotiations due to what they perceive as “a breakdown in communication between you [Jackson] and the Executive Committee and the players more broadly.”
The information that Plum and Stewart reportedly have sought but not received from the WNBPA includes:
The two players, according to Philippou and Van Natta Jr., wrote:
As we understand it, the Executive Committee’s role is to help shape the overall goals and priorities of the CBA and to serve as a bridge between your negotiating team and the broader membership—ultimately helping to secure player approval of any deal.
Without access to the information requested above, the Executive Committee cannot fulfill this role, and players cannot be expected to engage meaningfully in a process they have largely been excluded from.
They also shared their frustrations with WNBPA leadership’s response to players’ attempts to voice concerns, writing:
When we and other players have attempted to express concerns about negotiations, we have been made to feel as though we are acting against the interests of the PA. Many other players across the league feel these same frustrations and have expressed them to us, but feel afraid or unable to speak out.
Plum and Stewart additionally expressed that the relationship between union leadership and players “has begun to create unnecessary divisions at a time in which a united front and informed player body are essential to achieve maximum leverage.”
The points raised by Plum and Stewart appear to echo and expand those expressed by player agents in the letter sent to Jackson last week, which requested a “preference for transparency and coordinated communication” as negotiations progress.
As Plum and Stewart’s frustrations become public, the WNBA must be quite satisfied
Although Plum and Stewart’s letter can inspire much speculation about the divisions and alliances between WNBPA leadership, the WNBPA executive committee and the players more broadly, the primary takeaway from the letter and its contents is the advantageous position in which the league finds itself.
The WNBA, at least from the outside, has appeared to take a “run out the clock” approach to negotiations, most evidenced by the approximately six weeks it took the league to respond to a CBA proposal shared by the WNBPA in December. The league, likewise, has refused to budge on it’s revenue sharing offering of an estimated 15 percent of gross revenue, while also presenting limited concessions around housing and other matters of contention.
Then, the league announces a March 10 CBA deadline that the players seem to have accepted as real and enforceable, as, per Philippou and Van Natta Jr., Plum and specifically wrote that, “we are frustrated that we have not made more progress as we near the March 10 deadline.”
So, after months of delayed action from the league, the league then successfully injects a sense urgency on the players, with that pressure apparently leading to, if not division, then at least simmering differences.
All this comes after another banner night of Unrivaled, where Barclays Center was sold out for two thrilling semifinal games that brought in $1 million in gate revenue.
Unrivaled’s semifinals should be another point of proof that provides leverage for the WNBPA: The value in women’s professional basketball comes from the players that happen to play in the WNBA, not from the WNBA as an institution.
And yet, the WNBA’s “sit back and wait” approach to CBA negotiations seems evermore likely to result in the league continue to reap the majority of the value sown by players.
