CBS SPORTS: WNBA CBA showdown: Nneka Ogwumike says league 'unwilling to share in growth' as Congress joins WNBPA's fight

September 14, 2025

Democratic Women's Caucus calls for fair negotiations as league's CBA deadline approaches

On the penultimate day of the WNBA regular season, the Women's National Basketball Players Association (WNBPA) received Congressional support for its current labor negotiations. The Democratic Women's Caucus (DWC) sent a letter to the league urging commissioner Cathy Engelbert and the team owners to "bargain in good faith" with the WNBPA and reach a fair agreement before the Oct. 31 deadline.

"Thank you for spearheading this effort. The fact that you are vocal supporters of women's sports is tremendous. The fact that you're following and monitoring our negotiations is truly significant." Seattle Storm forward Nneka Ogwumike said on Wednesday's call.

"You see what we see, what our fans see, and what the world sees. This is a pivotal time for the WNBA, as we all know, this league is experiencing historic and sustainable growth, the broadcast deals, to the ticket sales to the rising valuations that we hear about every day, the WNBA is truly a winning proposition, a good investment with a real ROI, something that most of the people in the league office believe that the players don't understand."

In her remarks, Ogwumike, a 14-year veteran and the WNBPA president, also called attention to the parties that are in opposition to the players' demands for a more equitable pay scale.

"We are negotiating with the league and at least seven -- and who knows, maybe all 13 teams -- that seem unwilling to share in the growth that we are driving," the 2016 league MVP said.

A stalemate over revenue-sharing

WNBA team owners have reportedly been divided on CBA-related issues before, especially where significant financial investment is involved. This CBA fight primarily centers around revenue sharing. The WNBA players are looking for a new financial model that will allow them to benefit in real time as the league's business booms, while it seems the owners are looking for more of a fixed-cost model like the current one the WNBA operates under, which has a hard salary cap that only grows three percent each season.

As the final month before the negotiation deadline approaches, it does not appear that the parties have made headway.

"How can that really be?" Ogwumike asked on Wednesday. The call earlier this week came nearly two months after the players debuted 'PAY US WHAT YOU OWE US' T-shirts at the 2025 WNBA All-Star Game in Indianapolis.

"I think the league, hopefully, now understands the leverage that we have," Storm All-Star Gabby Williams said on the We Need To Talk Now podcast. "Hopefully they will pay us what they owe us, as we've said."

The Congressional signatories included DWC Chair Teresa Leger Fernández (NM-03), DWC Equality Caucus Liaison Julie Johnson (TX-32), DWC Member Lori Trahan (MA-03), DWC Member Angie Craig (MN-02) and Rep. Greg Stanton (AZ-04).

"WNBA players receive no shared revenue under the current CBA, including from TV deals, tickets, sponsorships, and merchandise sales. This is drastic in comparison with other major professional sports leagues: NBA players receive 49 to 51%, NFL players receive at least 48.8%, and NHL players receive 50% of their respective shared revenues," the caucus stated in its letter.

On Wednesday's call, Minnesota Congresswoman Angie Craig, an avid Lynx fan, added, "The WNBA is on a meteoric rise. More Americans are watching the WNBA than ever before. This season is already set to break last year's records for viewership and for ticket sales, and with the debut of a 13th WNBA team in the Bay Area, the league's reach is growing across the country."

The league broke a 23-year-old attendance record this year as more than 3.1 million fans attended regular-season games in 2025. Golden State Valkyries bested Indiana's league-leading, regular-season attendance record en route to a historic playoff berth. Golden State is the first expansion team to reach the postseason in its inaugural season.

The numbers are steadily rising, and the league hopes there will be no signs of stopping. The WNBA will introduce five new teams before 2030, and Congresswoman Craig believes players should reap the benefits of a booming business. (The three most recently announced expansion teams in Cleveland, Detroit and Philadelphia each paid an expansion fee of $250 million to join the league.) Higher WNBA salaries and a more equitable revenue split align with the goals of the DWC.

"If we're serious about equal pay for equal work in this country, and I know all of us standing up here today are very serious about that, we have to demand fair wages for women athletes, plain and simple," Craig said.

The WNBPA has proved it is serious and wants the WNBA to respond in kind as the negotiations continue.

"The main thing is a salary system that is tied to the business, so that these players are paid their value. Right now, we're in a system that, if you look at it, it's not tied to the business. So it's designed to undervalue them." WNBPA executive director Terri Jackson said at Bloomberg Power Players New York earlier this month.

The league doesn't deny that it has enjoyed gains in viewership, attendance, expansion fees, and overall valuation through sales and broadcast deals. WNBA commissioner Cathy Engelbert and the Board of Governors are reluctant to commit to salary increases or revenue share models that aren't sustainable.

"We've been building a new economic model, quite frankly, leading women's sports to build that model with our new media rights deals and with all the corporate partnerships. So yes, we want to have a fair deal for all, but it has to be within the confines of a sustainable economic model," Engelbert said in May at the 2025 WNBA Draft in New York City.

A looming lockout

Should the late October deadline pass without an enticing deal, the Players Association is prepared for a lockout.

"We've had conversations about the possibility of a work stoppage since before the opt-out date, because that's something you talk about when you're even choosing to opt out," Chicago Sky forward and WNBPA executive secretary Elizabeth Williams told CBS Sports in July.

"It's like, if you choose to opt out, you still have to negotiate a whole other contract. So we as players have had that conversation before, but hopefully we don't even get to that point."

Jackson refused to confirm a lockout was inevitable, but instead offered that it is one of three possibilities. The two sides could also negotiate a deadline extension like they did in 2019, when the previous CBA expired on Oct. 31 and the new CBA wasn't announced until early 2020.

"Everybody seems to go from 0 to 100 with a work stoppage, and there's going to be a strike and there's going to be a lockout," the Georgetown University Law Center alumna said earlier this month. "There's a process for all of this. Those aren't the automatics."

Should the WNBPA and the league not finalize a new CBA or agree to an extension, the union would still need to hold a vote for its members to authorize a strike.

The WNBA has never had an official work stoppage, but should there be a lockout that delays or cancels the 30th WNBA season next summer, Craig and Arizona Representative Greg Stanton will address the economic impact WNBA games have on the local economy. A work stoppage would have a direct effect on businesses that benefit from WNBA foot traffic in the summer.

"It would have had to have had a huge economic consequence to the city of Minneapolis in the state of Minnesota. So, I would encourage the commissioner and the owners to really listen to what your player representatives are saying and what they need in order for this to move forward successfully. It would be a real shame if the momentum that the WNBA and its owners are experiencing right now were to come to a halt," Craig told reporters Wednesday.

"Phoenix Mercury fans are hardcore. They go, they get out to the games early, and they enjoy going to restaurants and bars afterwards. With the expansion in the number of games in the WNBA schedule, that means that that would be over 20 home games in the heart of downtown Phoenix ... It would be a significant amount of lost revenue for them, and a real shame for the vibrancy of our downtown community," Stanton said.

It is unclear if or how politicians throwing their support behind the WNBPA will impact the ongoing negotiations with the league. WNBA players have always been willing to engage politicians, including the 2020 effort to elect Rafael Warnock and oust former Georgia Senator and Atlanta Dream co-owner Kelly Loeffler.

Engelbert, along with other league and team executives, has mostly remained quiet on the topic, hoping to keep the negotiations out of the public eye.

"The WNBA continues to meet regularly with the Women's National Basketball Players Association as part of the ongoing collective bargaining discussions and is committed to maintaining a respectful and collaborative process. We remain focused on reaching a new agreement that will be transformational and will reflect the progress the league has made and the shared goals of the players and our teams," a league representative told CBS Sports via email in July.