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Essentially trying to wrap 17 months of negotiations into one week, the WNBA and WNBPA exited a seventh consecutive overnight bargaining session at 3:40am ET Tuesday without a signed term sheet. Whether the sides are close to a CBA deal or not, the season is also getting close, and the next words out of WNBA Commissioner Cathy Engelbert’s mouth could be that exhibition games are off.
Asked early Monday if the scheduled April 19 start to training camp is realistic, Engelbert told reporters, “I wish I knew the answer to that. I do not know the answer to that.” But someone is going to blink, and it doesn’t appear to be the players.
The union, for instance, has repeatedly called Engelbert’s bluff. In late February, Engelbert had said there had to be a handshake deal by March 10 or there could be delays to the season. Nothing materialized. Then, this past week, she said there had to be a handshake deal by Monday or there could be delays to the season. And after another interminable 13-hour-and-40-minute session Monday that drained into Tuesday, nothing again materialized.
“There are deadlines, arbitrary ones, that the league has set, and then there’s a season schedule that has its own milestones,” WNBPA Exec Dir Terri Jackson told reporters earlier Monday, via ESPN. “Absolutely, we recognize that, and we respect those. But do we also recognize that these are big-time negotiations, and so there may be a need to adjust? Absolutely. And the players, more importantly, recognize that, understand that, and are prepared for that as they always have been.”
WNBA teams, according to sources, have been standing by waiting to hear from the league office whether the 2026 schedule will be altered. They also realize the impasse has virtually everything to do with revenue sharing — the players have wanted their split to be in the 26% range and the league has not previously budged much past 15-to-16%.
Sources told SBJ Monday that a compromise and a deal have seemed imminent for days — except talks have just dragged on. The union’s outside counsel, Deb Willig, told ESPN before Monday’s session, for instance, that she could foresee a deal getting done within 15-20 hours, while also admitting it’s been an atypical negotiation.
The two sides are scheduled to start their eighth consecutive day of bargaining later Tuesday.
