WNBA approaching collision of interests

By MARK HELLER
Tribune
America’s largest women’s professional sports league will come to a financial crossroads shortly after September’s WNBA championship celebration.Armed with a new eight-year, multi-million dollar TV contract with ESPN and ABC, the league is creeping closer to financial independence, but its players will seek a bigger chunk of that change when the collective bargaining agreement expires Sept. 15. Here comes a collision. This is the first broadcasting deal in which the WNBA receives broadcast fees, both from TV and the Internet. It’s also the first deal independent of the NBA’s $930 million TV deal completed in June, which the WNBA sees as continued financial freedom from its big brother. “We anticipate moving closer to break-even and profitability and we anticipate a new TV deal, and we won’t know until we move ahead,” WNBA commissioner Donna Orender said during last Tuesday’s Mercury game. “But the expectation is that’s the direction we’re moving in, and quickly.” Orender wouldn’t offer a specific dollar figure for the TV deal, or how much would trickle down to each team and its players, but the union has made little secret of its desire to increase player benefits. More than 100 WNBA players spend six months overseas, some for fivefold the money. The current WNBA minimum salary is $30,400 for four months of work; the maximum is $93,000. “I’m sure that will be a negotiating discussion,” Orender said, “and I think we’ll get a deal done.” Paychecks, however, aren’t as high on the pecking order as perks. Among the issues: • Travel — Unlike the NFL, NBA, NHL and Major League Baseball, WNBA teams fly coach and share hotel rooms. “It’s tough when you’re 6-foot-4 with a middle seat, flying across the country,” said Mercury veteran Olympia Scott, one of the team’s two player representatives with Diana Taurasi. “You’re screwed.” The league will arrange for players’ housing together and provides funds for one car rental per two players during the season (many, including Taurasi, bring their own car to their WNBA destinations), which players say leads to more inconvenience and scheduling problems getting to a grocery store. “You take care of those things and they make life a little easier,” Taurasi said. • Salary cap — Currently, the cap is $728,000 per team. If a team doesn’t use all its allotted cap space, the league sends a check to the players union for the difference. In addition to a salary cap increase, Catchings said the union will push for a “soft” cap, a yet-to-be-determined dollar amount above the hard cap that would allow players more earning potential to compete with international basketball salaries. “Going overseas, they rely on it financially and keep you in shape in different ways,” Catchings said. “Some really need that money. We only get paid four to five months. The next seven months we don’t get anything from the WNBA.” Another facet to the soft cap would be a team’s flexibility to sign veteran players who make more than the rookie minimum, but are getting squeezed financially because of the hard cap and teams’ need to pay top dollar to keep the elite. “Veteran players who you want on your team, on your bench, in the locker room, who may also play crucial minutes but aren’t the top tier, those players suffer from the way it’s set up,” Scott said. “You have to spend money to make money. It’s hard to convince people of that.” Which leads to ... • Free agency — This is another potential means to increase income. The WNBA salaries can’t compete with those overseas, but Europe and Asia don’t allow American players to compete against what they consider to be the world’s best competition in front of family and friends. But they also feel stuck. Players need five years in the league before they can become restricted free agents, six years to be unrestricted. “Obviously you want the league to sustain its top-billed players and gain a following, but people should have the freedom to use the market, which is pretty much used in every other profession,” Taurasi said. Both sides this week said they don’t foresee messiness with a new bargaining agreement, but with the league’s modest increase in attendance and millions in TV revenue coming, players feel it’s their turn to pocket some of the profit. “For us to expect charter flights and millions is unrealistic and we realize that,” Catchings said. “I think upgrades would change a lot of perspectives. It’s simple stuff.”