Ten of 15 WNBA teams have extended core qualifying offers to players since free agency started Monday.<\/p>\n
Players who have been “cored” — akin to being given the NFL’s franchise tag — include Sabrina Ionescu<\/a>, by the New York Liberty<\/a>; Napheesa Collier<\/a>(Minnesota Lynx<\/a>); Kelsey Mitchell<\/a>(Indiana Fever<\/a>); Kelsey Plum<\/a>, (Los Angeles Sparks<\/a>); and Arike Ogunbowale<\/a>(Dallas Wings<\/a>).<\/p>\n The core designation gives a team exclusive negotiating rights to a player and comes with a baseline contract of a fully guaranteed one-year deal worth the supermax ($1.4 million in 2026), though the player can negotiate different terms.<\/p>\n The core designation can also be a way for a team to prevent a player from walking in free agency without getting anything in return as it ultimately executes a sign-and-trade with the star.<\/p>\n Other players who were cored by teams this week include Allisha Gray<\/a> (Atlanta Dream<\/a>), Ariel Atkins<\/a> (Chicago Sky<\/a>) and Ezi Magbegor<\/a> (Seattle Storm<\/a>).<\/p>\n The unrestricted free agents the Portland Fire<\/a> and Toronto Tempo<\/a> selected in last week’s expansion draft were also given core qualifying offers: Bridget Carleton<\/a>, whom Portland chosefrom Minnesota; and Marina Mabrey<\/a>, whom Toronto chose from the Connecticut Sun<\/a>.<\/p>\n Teams were also able to send out reserved and restricted qualifying offers to players during this designation period, which began Monday.<\/p>\n Negotiations will run Wednesday through Friday, while signings can start Saturday. Training camp is scheduled to begin April 19 and the first preseason games are set for April 25.<\/p>\n Free agency and other offseason activity were delayed this year as the league and players union negotiated a new CBA, which was agreed upon and ratified by both sides in late March. The long-form contract is still being executed.<\/p>\n Copyright \u00a9 2026 ESPN Internet Ventures. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ten of 15 WNBA teams have extended core qualifying offers to players since free agency started Monday. Players…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":189185,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[75898,75893,68626,27377,75888,27375,3080,75891,75895,75889,62443,75890,68625,75894,68624,75896,9,11,8915,10,12,75897,75892,68629,11453,68630,11452],"class_list":{"0":"post-189184","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york","8":"tag-75898","9":"tag-atkins-ariel","10":"tag-atlanta-dream","11":"tag-chicago-sky","12":"tag-collier-napheesa","13":"tag-dallas-wings","14":"tag-espn","15":"tag-espnw","16":"tag-espnw-sports","17":"tag-gray-allisha","18":"tag-indiana-fever","19":"tag-ionescu-sabrina","20":"tag-los-angeles-sparks","21":"tag-magbegor-ezi","22":"tag-minnesota-lynx","23":"tag-mitchell-kelsey","24":"tag-new-york","25":"tag-new-york-headlines","26":"tag-new-york-liberty","27":"tag-new-york-news","28":"tag-news","29":"tag-ogunbowale-arike","30":"tag-plum-kelsey","31":"tag-portland-fire","32":"tag-seattle-storm","33":"tag-toronto-tempo","34":"tag-wnba"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/189184","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=189184"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/189184\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/189185"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=189184"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=189184"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=189184"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}