{"id":426016,"date":"2026-01-24T00:28:08","date_gmt":"2026-01-24T00:28:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/426016\/"},"modified":"2026-01-24T00:28:08","modified_gmt":"2026-01-24T00:28:08","slug":"wnba-still-hasnt-responded-to-union-proposal-as-talks-remain-stagnant","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/426016\/","title":{"rendered":"WNBA still hasn’t responded to union proposal as talks remain stagnant"},"content":{"rendered":"

Although talks are ongoing and apparently civil, sources told SBJ on Friday that the WNBA still has not responded<\/a> to a month-old players\u2019 union proposal, while sources close to the league conversely believe they have acquiesced on the core issues far more than the WNBPA.<\/p>\n

The result is a stagnated collective bargaining agreement negotiation heading into a critical final week of January, with both sides seemingly waiting for the other to blink.<\/p>\n

On the surface, the league has taken a somewhat presumptuous business-as-usual approach by announcing its 2026 schedule<\/a> and cluing in sponsors and media outlets on key dates. But the union, which has been authorized to strike if it sees fit, purportedly sees that as perhaps a tone-deaf leverage play and, according to sources, wonders when the league will start behaving as if it is crunch time.<\/p>\n

The barrier to a deal remains the percentage carve-up of the revenue pie. In December, the union requested a 30% share and a salary cap in the neighborhood of $10M-plus. The league did its own math based on that proposal, and, according to sources, calculated it would lose $700M over the course of the six-year offer. <\/p>\n

Sources have intimated, at that point, the league didn\u2019t believe a direct response to the union was necessary \u2014 especially since its own offer to the players of over a $1.3M max salary and a $530,000 average salary in 2026, plus a 70% share of net revenue, was met with resistance. <\/p>\n

The union, sources said, believed that 70% of net revenue equaled about 15% of gross revenue, which is why the offer was a non-starter \u2014 and why 104 days before the 2026 season opener, there is no deal in sight.<\/p>\n

Some of this boils down to semantics. All along the players wanted to eliminate the league\u2019s hard salary cap \u2014 and WNBA sources say they gave in. All along, the players preferred a revenue sharing model in which their salaries would grow as the business grows \u2014 and WNBA sources say they gave in. All along the players wanted team revenue, in addition to league revenue, tied to the overall revenue share \u2014 and WNBA sources say they gave in.<\/p>\n

But, according to union sources, these were concessions that are not as momentous as they seem. Players such as Breanna Stewart have hoped for a deal by Feb. 1, or at least early February, which she felt would give the league a proper runway for an expansion draft, a free agency window and a season starting on time May 8. But unless there\u2019s a positive response soon to the union proposal or until the players back off the 30% number, a Feb. 1 deal seems farfetched.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Although talks are ongoing and apparently civil, sources told SBJ on Friday that the WNBA still has not…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":426017,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[73],"tags":[99,434,17953],"class_list":{"0":"post-426016","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wnba","8":"tag-sports","9":"tag-wnba","10":"tag-wnbpa"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/426016","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=426016"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/426016\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/426017"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=426016"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=426016"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=426016"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}