By Angelica Medina<\/p>\n
Nov 30 (Reuters) \u2013 The Women\u2019s National Basketball Association (WNBA) is hurtling toward a potential lockout or strike with pay talks deadlocked ahead of Sunday\u2019s deadline over the players\u2019 push for a bigger share of the league\u2019s explosive growth in revenue.<\/p>\n
The current Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) was due to expire on October 31, but has been extended to November 30. However, a deal appears increasingly unlikely, raising the prospect of a work stoppage that could disrupt the 2026 season.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey\u2019ll probably do another extension, yet if we get to the New Year without an agreement a strike becomes a realistic option,\u201d Daniel Kelly II, an associate dean and professor at New York University who specializes in sports law, said in an interview on Wednesday.<\/p>\n
\u201cHistorically, that has led to the best deal for players. For the NBA, the 50\u201350 deal came after the strike in 2011\u201312. It almost seems like you have to push to the edge to get the deal you want,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
According to local media reports, the league has proposed increasing the maximum salary from $250,000 to $1.1 million, raising the average player salary to more than $460,000 and increasing the minimum salary to $220,000.<\/p>\n
However, WNBA players want more than just salary increases. They believe they should follow the NBA\u2019s path, which began with their first CBA in 1970 and by 2011 had negotiated a 50-50 split of basketball-related income.<\/p>\n
\u201cPlayers are pushing for revenue-sharing arrangements similar to those in men\u2019s professional leagues, rather than fixed salary increases that don\u2019t keep pace with the WNBA\u2019s growth in media deals and team valuations,\u201d Kelly said. \u201cThe business is growing exponentially, yet they want the players salaries to increase at a fixed amount.\u201d<\/p>\n
COMPLEX OWNERSHIP AND RIVAL LEAGUES ADD PRESSURE<\/p>\n
The ownership structure adds a layer of complexity to the discussion. The NBA itself owns 42% of the WNBA, while team owners hold another 42% and a private equity group controls the remaining 16%.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs the WNBA\u2019s commissioner, Cathy Engelbert represents three groups. She has multiple stakeholders to answer to in different capacities when negotiating against the players\u2019 union,\u201d Kelly said, noting that it makes negotiations far more difficult than simple two-party bargaining.<\/p>\n
Rival leagues dangling eye-popping pay cheques\u00a0further complicate matters. Unrivaled, a 3-on-3 basketball league which began its first season in January, reported an average salary of $222,222, which included amenities such as on-site childcare.<\/p>\n
Even more threatening is Project B, which plans to launch next fall with men\u2019s and women\u2019s 5-on-5 basketball and is reportedly offering salaries up to $2 million. It has signed WNBA players union (WNBPA) president Nneka Ogwumike, along with big names like Alyssa Thomas and Sophie Cunningham.<\/p>\n
\u201cDo we know if these new leagues can sustain those salaries? We don\u2019t because they haven\u2019t been around for multiple seasons. However it gives players leverage to say to the league: you\u2019re not the only option,\u201d Kelly added.<\/p>\n
He recommended a hybrid model that maintains minimum and maximum salaries but includes guaranteed revenue-sharing percentages that grow with the business.<\/p>\n
\u201cPlayers look for clarity and the league needs to show them the long-term plan, the possibilities of how you get to 50-50, even if it\u2019s 20 years from now,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
With the clock ticking toward Sunday\u2019s deadline, both sides face a critical decision: compromise now, or risk a work stoppage that could undermine their hard-won momentum.<\/p>\n
(Reporting by Angelica Medina in Mexico City; Editing by Sonali Paul)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Angelica Medina Nov 30 (Reuters) \u2013 The Women\u2019s National Basketball Association (WNBA) is hurtling toward a potential…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":316040,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[629],"tags":[49,48,82,630],"class_list":["post-316105","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wnba","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-sports","tag-wnba"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/316105","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=316105"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/316105\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/316040"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=316105"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=316105"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=316105"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}