New York Liberty star Breanna Stewart didn’t mince words when discussing the WNBA’s ongoing labor negotiations, leadership dynamics and the growing tension between players and the league. Stewart, a vice president of the Women’s National Basketball Players’ Association, said she would welcome NBA commissioner Adam Silver stepping directly into the WNBA’s collective bargaining talks, signaling frustration with the current lack of progress.
“What we’re doing right now isn’t really getting us anywhere, so if that means that Adam and (NBA deputy commissioner) Mark (Tatum) need to come to the table? We’re more than happy to have that,” Stewart said during a news conference Wednesday ahead of the second season of Unrivaled, the 3×3 league she co-founded.
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Silver, speaking Tuesday night ahead of the NBA Cup Final in Las Vegas, said he has been closely monitoring the talks, and that both he and Tatum are open to participating directly. While WNBA commissioner Cathy Engelbert has been a constant at the negotiating table, Engelbert reports up to Silver at the league office, and remains a key player in the discussions.
“We’re integrated at the league office,” Silver said. “I talk to the people who are at the negotiating table on a daily basis. As I’ve said before, we — the NBA, WNBA collective — acknowledged that our players deserve to be paid significantly more than they have so far based on the increased success of the league, and it’s just a question now of finding a meeting of the minds in terms of what is a fair deal. It’s going to require compromise on both sides.”
Stewart pushed back on the idea that compromise hasn’t been offered by players. “We’re the ones that are willing to compromise, and they still aren’t budging,” she said.
She warned that negotiations are at a difficult stage, and “if they’re not going to budge, we’re gonna get to this point where we’re just going to be at like a standoff, and that’s kind of where we’re at right now.”
The league and players’ association remain in talks after twice extending negotiations beyond the expiration of the previous CBA on Oct. 31. The current deadline is Jan. 9. Both sides have said they want to sign a “transformational” agreement, which will entail player salaries significantly increasing.
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At the heart of the dispute is money — specifically, the league’s salary system and how league revenue is shared. While both sides agree players deserve substantial raises after years of rapid league growth, they disagree on how revenue should be split and how compensation should be calculated.
As previously reported by The Athletic, the union has proposed that players receive roughly 30 percent of total league and team revenue annually. The league’s counterproposal would result in players receiving less than 15 percent of league and team revenue.
Under the union’s proposal, the salary cap would be calculated by taking players’ revenue share from the previous season, subtracting the cost of benefits and dividing the remainder evenly across teams. The league’s proposed system involves a salary cap remaining in place over the course of the agreement, but would see to it that players could receive additional revenue after an end-of-season audit.
Stewart acknowledged the difficulty of balancing the desire to play with the need to be properly valued.
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“We know how important as players it is to play and to be on the court,” Stewart said. “But at the same time, if we’re not going to be valued the way that we know we should be, in the way that every kind of number situation tells us, then we’re just not going to do something that doesn’t make sense for us.”
Tensions between the league and its players escalated earlier this fall when Minnesota Lynx star Napheesa Collier, who is also a WNBPA vice president, criticized league leadership and revealed comments she said Engelbert made to her earlier this year. Collier said Tuesday that her opinion of league leadership hasn’t changed since her pointed remarks.
“I mean, nothing has changed since then, but I feel really confident in our PA (players’ association) and where we are internally,” Collier said. “The conversation has been had now. People are seeing, I think, that change needs to be had. It’s coming from so many different directions that so many people feel this way, and I think we’re just really excited for the future, and what that has to hold.”
“All these different leaks popping up on Rivals, our CBA negotiations, like the future just seems so bright,” she added.
This article originally appeared in The Athletic.
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