What new collective bargaining agreement means for WNBA players and the Phoenix Mercury

The WNBA and its players have reached agreement on a new collective bargaining agreement. Assuming it’s approved by union membership and the league’s board of governors, the salary cap and minimum salaries will increase, as will the amount of revenue sharing — among other provisions.

The deal came after a year of contentious talks. More recently, the sides spent some long days and nights together as they neared a deal.

And it now means that teams and players have a lot to do before the season is scheduled to start in early May.

Sabreena Merchant with the Athletic joined The Show to talk more about this.

Full conversation

MARK BRODIE: So what are some of the highlights of the new agreement or CBA, which some of the union membership has called transformational?

SABREENA MERCHANT: Yeah, I think the money is really the biggest highlight. Previously, the WNBA never had a salary cap that was tied to revenue. It was just fixed increases. And now with all of the money the league is bringing in, the players made that their number one priority of wanting their salaries to be directly governed by the revenue sharing, which is 20% over the life of the CBA.

So that’s going to result in a salary cap of $7 million in 2026, compared to $1.5 million last year. You’ve got maximum salaries of $1.4 million in this deal, again, basically equivalent to the cap last year, and minimum salaries of about $300,000, which is more than the maximum salary of $250,000 last year.

BRODIE: How did they get here? Because I remember last year at the All-Star Game, the players were wearing T-shirts that said basically, “pay us what we’re worth.” This was not a kumbaya kind of thing from the beginning.

MERCHANT: No, I think it’s very fair to call this a contentious set of negotiations. I mean, you mentioned the “pay us what you owe us” shirts. We also had Napheesa Collier, who’s one of the vice presidents of the union, basically using her exit interview as a bully pulpit to call out Cathy Engelbert and the WNBA leadership for being the worst in the world.

And then they’re sitting in a room together for eight days trying to figure out a new agreement. So I think there was an understanding that, hey, the finances of the WNBA have changed dramatically since the last time we sat down to bargain in 2020. Obviously, there’s a lot more money coming to the league.

And even though ownership wants to be compensated for all the years where they footed the bill when the league was not making money, the players are also the biggest driver of revenue, and they deserve a big cut of it. Especially because you think about why the league has become popular, it’s because of these college megastars like Caitlin Clark, Angel Reese, Paige Bueckers entering the league.

So I think it was an understanding that, yes, both sides want the money that is coming into the league, but the players were, I think, more willing to hold out than you’ll see in other labor negotiations because the WNBA is not their primary source of income. They’ve been preparing for work stoppage for multiple years and the owners really saw an opportunity to get money into the WNBA for the first time and didn’t want to waste it.

BRODIE: Well, so I wonder about that because the WNBA has seen, as we’ve talked about before, a surge in popularity because of players like Caitlin Clark and Angel Reese and Paige Bueckers and others.

Was there a sense maybe between both sides, maybe just on one side or the other, that this was not a great time to maybe have a self-inflicted wound of missing games or canceling a season?

MERCHANT: Absolutely. I think there was an understanding from the players and the league — and both sides publicly said it — like, we need to play basketball this year. And you don’t usually hear that from ownership when there is a lockout or a work stoppage.

And I should be clear, there was no actual work stoppage triggered by the WNBA. They were just in a weird status quo period.

But usually when you’re in these labor negotiations, the owners in the league are willing to hold out and wait and sort of squeeze the players. And this was a rare situation where the WNBA was like no, we, we actually need to play games right now. We have this golden goose, and we can’t afford to sit out.

And I think that gave the, the players union a unique source of leverage to get a lot of what they were looking for in this deal.

BRODIE: Yeah. So again, assuming that this is ratified by the league and the union — and I’ve not read maybe, I assume you would feel the same way; there’s no reason to believe that it won’t be — what has to happen now because, as you’ve reported, there’s a lot that that happens in the next several weeks?

MERCHANT: Yeah. So just for clarification, the WNBA offseason usually starts Feb. 1 and then has like a one-month, two-month free agency period before we get into the draft and then training camps start after that.

And now we’re looking at five weeks of free agency and training camp and you know, the start of the season. Plus, because the WNBA is welcoming two new teams into the league — the Toronto Temple and the Portland Fire — they have to have expansion drafts for those two teams. So that’s another scheduled event during the offseason, has to take place before the college draft and before free agency.

And we should mention free agency because everybody knew the new CBA was coming up this year. Every veteran in the league, save for two.

So we have more than 100 players who are unrestricted free agents this offseason and will have to sign new contracts.

BRODIE: Oh my gosh.

MERCHANT: So there is a lot of business to be done before training camp starts on April 19 and then the season tips off on May 8.

BRODIE: So does that mean that we should be looking for a lot of, if not player movement then a lot of signings coming up in the next several days and weeks?

MERCHANT: Yes. So I think you’re right about not necessarily a ton of player movement because people aren’t necessarily signing new contracts because they want to leave. It’s just because, well, they’re making four to five times as much money on these contracts as they would had they signed a longer term contract before.

But yeah, there’s going to be a lot of deals signed. We’ve already seen reports of A’ja Wilson will be signing a supermax contract in Las Vegas, which, like, of course. But yeah, lots of deals will be coming through the pipeline. I don’t think most of them are going to start to hit the paper until early April.

You know, WNBA front offices have a lot to do right now, just scouting the NCAA tournament. So lots of things going on.

BRODIE: Well, so I got to ask in the last minute or so we have, the Phoenix Mercury, of course, made a very surprising run to the WNBA Finals last season. Any sense of who, if they can bring back some percentage of that core that they have or if there are free agents that they might be looking at?

MERCHANT: Well, the goal when they assembled the trio of Satou Sabally, Alyssa Thomas and Kahleah Copper last year was that this would be their foundation for years to come. And again, just because they’re free agents this year doesn’t mean that they didn’t enjoy their experience in Phoenix or not want to come back.

And you see all of the social media and public statements, you know, from the front office talking about, like how much they’re looking forward to the future with the team. Kahleah Copper, Nate Tibbetts just went with Team USA to their World Cup qualifying tournament. They obviously look like they’re going to be spending a lot of time together going forward, not just as parts of Team USA.

So I would imagine that, yes, AT, Satou, Kahleah are all going to be back in Mercury uniforms. How they build out the rest of the roster is an open question because they had a lot of first year players in the WNBA last year, and they might have other opportunities or maybe not want to come back to the league.

Who knows? So the trio of stars, I’d be very surprised if that didn’t land back in Phoenix. But nine other players on the roster, so we’ll see how that plays out.