The WNBA and the players association agreed to a moratorium Monday that will suspend free agency until a new collective bargaining agreement is signed, sources with knowledge of the negotiations said.
The parties are currently in a status quo period after an extension to the CBA expired last week. That means the league is operating under the normal working conditions of the prior CBA. However, under those terms, free agency would have begun on Jan. 11 with the extension of qualifying offers and core designations. To avoid the confusion of conducting free agency under both the current cap environment and a new salary structure in the upcoming CBA, the league and the union will have a moratorium on those transactions until a new deal is agreed upon.
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Free agency rules are among the negotiation priorities in the new CBA. The players union would like to eliminate the core designation, which allows franchises to exercise an additional two years of team control over unrestricted free agents. The WNBA thus far has insisted on maintaining the core as a team-building tool. The union would also like to shorten the length of rookie contracts from four years to three.
How free agents are classified will also impact the expansion drafts for the Toronto Tempo and Portland Fire. In previous drafts, expansion teams were allowed to select only one unrestricted free agent because each organization could core only one player. If the rules of the core are changed, that will have downstream effects on the expansion process.
Although free agency is no longer operating as usual, the status quo period applies to other league business. The WNBA (including owners and front offices) and its players will still be able to communicate with one another, and players can access league and team facilities. The players association also recently launched a network of player hub training facilities in the U.S. and in Spain so that WNBA players maintain access to courts, weight rooms and recovery spaces during the offseason.
This article originally appeared in The Athletic.
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