Inside the WNBA’s 8-day, 100-hour CBA negotiations that forged a transformational deal

NEW YORK — The intense, all-night negotiations over the WNBA’s collective bargaining agreement were new to many on both sides.

The grueling discussions lasted eight days and went well into the early morning hours each session. More than 100 hours were spent hammering out the transformational deal that was agreed to in principle early on March 18.

From “sandbox” meetings to delicacies from a local bakery and a stroll down Fifth Avenue during the St. Patrick’s Day parade, it wasn’t just discussions that took place during the negotiations.

Here’s a look behind the scenes at some of what happened during the marathon sessions as told to The Associated Press.

Negotiations setup

Representatives for the WNBA and its players met at three different places in New York — The Langham Hotel, NBA headquarters and union headquarters. At all three spots, each side had its own areas to talk as well as a central meeting room where discussions took place.

There wasn’t much face-to-face time between the two sides during the endless hours of negotiating each day. They’d get together for an hour in the main room where conversations could be civil or turn heated. The two sides would then head back to their own areas to digest what had happened and mull over proposals.

Many of the discussions took place in smaller groups. Union outside counsel Deborah R. Willig and WNBA outside lawyer Shannon Farmer had many side conversations, which the players fondly called “sandbox” meetings.

“There were quite a few sandbox meetings,” union executive committee member Brianna Turner said. “Sandbox definitely had a positive tone to it.”

Willig said she’s known Farmer for a long time and they have negotiated numerous other deals with each other over the past 20-25 years.

“We went out of the room to see what would fly on either side,” Willig said. “Nothing was ever done. I mean, I want to be very clear, nothing was ever done that was not communicated to the staff and to the leadership.”

When the meetings moved back to The Langham Hotel for the final day, WNBA staff rolled a cart with printers, monitors and other electronics down Fifth Avenue during the St. Patrick’s Day parade for the 14-block trip from league headquarters.

Checking off items

While revenue sharing and housing were the big items that took a lot of time to discuss and settle on over the course of the in-person meetings, there were many smaller issues that needed to be ironed out.

Even before the sides started meeting on March 10, they had agreed on many things that would be in the CBA. Still, there was a lot left that needed to be done. With so many of the items impacting the economic structure, it wasn’t so simple to get things done quickly.

“I couldn’t necessarily tell you specifically when things were done, but up until Friday, the small groups that we were meeting in were more effective,” union president Nneka Ogwumike said. “That’s when things started taking more motion.”

Alysha Clark kept a journal of the eight days and at one point when they were discussing rookie salaries, the veteran was able to pull up her rookie contract on her computer. Clark, drafted in the second round in 2010, earned roughly $36,000 her first year. Now through the hard work of the union and the league, rookies would be making potentially 10 times that.

Late-night food runs

With negotiations going on for hours, both sides needed to figure out nightly dinner orders. Ogwumike gave that responsibility to Clark, who was glad to lead the charge.

“They weren’t heated discussions, but they were stressful,” Clark recalled, laughing. “Nneka delegated to me and thank goodness we are all foodies. (Brianna Turner) is a foodie who loves to explore, too, so I said to her I needed her help.”

Brazilian, Italian and Mexican were some of the top choices from the players’ side. Bagels were catered every morning, and Breanna Stewart brought pastries from her favorite Brooklyn bakery one morning.

“It’s near my house, so it’s where I always get good stuff,” Stewart said. “So I grabbed some baked goods to bring in for everyone to enjoy.”

The league also had its own negotiations each night about what food to get. Some nights it was sushi, others it was Mexican or Italian.

Each side definitely had a sweet tooth, with ice cream brought in a few times.

Burning the midnight oil

Each negotiating session went well past midnight and into the early morning hours, stretching up to 15 or 16 hours some days. Part of that was negotiating tactics to try to tire out the other side, but both knew how important this deal was and didn’t want to make any mistakes.

“There were points in time where it reached 3 or 4 (a.m.), where I would say, and the other side would say to call it quits for the night,” Willig said. “We can’t be wrong. We can’t miss language, we can’t make mistakes. This is too important. So let’s just reconvene, let everybody get some sleep, be clear-eyed the next day.”

Players sometimes left hours before the lawyers for both sides did.

On the final night, the players said they had just left a meeting when a few minutes later they were called back into the main meeting room.

Packing and planning

No one expected the in-person negotiations to take as long as they did. Clark, Turner and Ogwumike all flew in for the meetings and had originally thought they’d be able to get the CBA done before the weekend.

Clark said one of her goals this year was to pack only carry-ons as often as possible and that’s what she did for the negotiations. She had to stop by a few stores to pick up some clothes and when she went home for a day to broadcast the Tennessee state championship, she came back ready to stay for the long haul.

“The second go-round I packed a few extra options,” she said. “If I’m here longer than my suitcase allows, I’ll pop over to Adidas.”

Ogwumike said she apologized to the executive committee for not warning them that it could take a while. Unlike the previous CBA negotiations in 2019 that only had one in-person late-night session, Ogwumike had a feeling this one would last longer with so much at stake.

“I fully expected how it should go, but I didn’t think it would go that long,” she said.

The waiting game

There was a lot of downtime for both sides between proposals being shared. The players played pool or worked out to stay ready for the start of the season. They also watched their favorite TV shows on their electronic devices.

One Sunday night, though, was reserved for the Oscars. Players huddled around Clark’s computer watching the broadcast on a livestream after they couldn’t get it on any of the big screens at the WNBA offices. When Michael B. Jordan won for best actor, the group let out a loud scream that brought staff members running, thinking a breakthrough might have happened.

“No one knew how to work the TVs, so we sat around my computer and watched,” Clark said. “We erupted when Autumn (Durald Arkapaw) won for best cinematographer. This was indicative of what was going to come for us.”

Arkapaw was the first woman to win the Academy Award in the category and the first woman of color to be nominated for it.

Stewart was watching as much basketball as she could during the downtime.

“I was watching the (World Cup) qualifiers on my tablet,” she said.

The four-time NCAA champion at UConn admitted that with all the long hours of negotiating, she forgot Sunday night was the selection show for this year’s tournament. UConn got the No. 1 overall seed.

“I really didn’t know,” she said. “Because I feel like all my things were kind of a blur. Then I was like, this is my favorite time of the year and now I’m just missing it, obviously for good reason, but it’s still missing.”

Stewart was able to make it to Connecticut for the Huskies’ first-round win.

Striking a deal

After eight intense days of negotiations, the suspense was definitely building on that final night. The sides had gotten together around 4 p.m. Tuesday. Well past midnight, a deal hadn’t been reached yet. The sides had just met again around 2 a.m. when Terri Carmichael Jackson came back into the union’s room and said the players should come back in immediately.

“We’re going to go meet with the league and Cathy was in the room,” Stewart recalled. “Cathy said that throughout this entire negotiation it’s been tough, but it’s been worth it and that they were ready to offer us a deal. We accepted.”

Stewart and her fellow committee members felt proud of what they had accomplished.

“Current and former players are going to really be able to be benefit from the CBA in a way like no other and that’s because of everyone’s work to make that happen,” she said. “Definitely just felt really proud and excited and at that point it didn’t really feel like it was 3 a.m.”