Players, fans put CBA center stage during WNBA All-Star Weekend

Indianapolis – “Pay us what you owe us.”

It was a simple message sporting the players of the players during the warm-up before the WNBA star match on Saturday, but also a weekend encapsulation.

To also succeed and great as everything that was about the stars weekend in Indianapolis, there was a dominant subject that dominated the conversation even before the players spoke on Saturday: the imminent expiration of the ABC.

WNBA growth has been rapid and seismic. Unsurprisingly, the most popular team in the city of the League has proven to be significantly.

The fans were released, whether for All-Stars, WNBA players or university athletes, not even in the League. And yet, it doesn’t matter if it was a pop-up shop, a sponsored event or a simple meeting, the conversation has almost always returned to the same subject.

And it was the fans who had the last word on the issue.

After the victory of Team Collier 151-131 – and during the MVP ceremony for Captain Napheesa Collier – the fans drowned the WNBA commissioner, Cathy Engelbert, with songs “Them”.

The current collective negotiation agreement is expected to expire on October 31. The aforementioned growth of the League means that it has completely exceeded its current CBA in many ways, and drastic changes are necessary.

An adjusted base for the weekend allowed nearly 40 players to meet the owners and Engelbert for negotiations on Thursday. The feeling that emerged from this meeting, however, was more than anything else.

The growth of the league, especially in recent seasons, has started to highlight the need for a significant improvement in the new CBA, creating an apparent inevitable dichotomy throughout the weekend.

Before the match, Engelbert spoke to the media and delighted how the record hearing of the League (up 22%), attendance (up 26%) and sales of goods (up 40%) increased at all levels. In the same place 24 hours earlier, Liberty Guardian Natasha Cloud told journalists that she would use her earnings to win the trophy in the challenge of skills as a component on a house.

To also illustrate how exceeded the ACB is currently paying $ 2,575 to the winners of Friday events. A partnership between WNBPA and AFLAC led the Cloud to win $ 55,000 for winning the skills challenge and Sabrina Ionescu earned $ 60,000 after being crowned winner in the 3 -point shooting.

Ionescu revealed after the match that she had promised half of her winnings at the recruit Sonia Citron, who also participated in the 3 -point competition. This figure represents almost half of the lemon salary of $ 78,831 this season.

“I think this is one of the things we are in the room to fight,” said Caitlin Clark about higher wages before Saturday’s match. “We should be paid more and, hope, this is the case to move forward while the league continues to grow. I think it is probably the most important thing we are in the room.”

The players made their most noisy statement with their shirts before the match, a clear indication of the place where they thought that things were stood in negotiations with the owners. This came for a few moments after Gelbert expressed a much more optimistic perspective on ABC negotiations, further stressing the significant distance between the two parties.

“I want to call this constructive,” said Engelbert about talks this weekend. “We had a frank dialogue. It’s part of the process … I want a lot of the same things as players want. I said this last time too. It hasn’t changed.

“But we must also have a process where we are going and come. We are in the process. Again, I am always very optimistic that we will do something that will be transformational and next year in All-Star, we will talk about the quality of everything. Obviously, there is a lot of hard work to do on both sides to get there.”

Calling this CBA to come would be quite the euphemism. The increase in the popularity of the league is similar to takeoff of rockets. The question is now to know what type of rocket will imitate the league: a miniature model that quickly goes up on earth when thrown into the air, or a spacecraft of NASA which goes towards the great stranger and continues to climb?

This next CBA will help determine what this future looks like.

“A CBA [deal] is seven years, “said necklace.” You never know how long you need to play and therefore obviously I take it really seriously for me, but also for future generations, we create the next CBA. You must always think about it too and therefore the decisions made here affect many people and therefore of course, we make it very seriously. “”

As much as players can have a unified message, obtaining fans’ support also looked like substantial development. Delivery of the message was important, but taking foot in the public opinion court was even more important.

“It was a very powerful moment,” said Kelsey Plum, the first current WNBPA vice-president. “It is extremely important .. because it applies the pressure and even these songs this evening, the signs, I think it simply shows that, obviously, because the players are united, but the fans are united in what they believe that we are looking for and it is extremely important because this pressure could put a lot of good things on the table for us.”

Plum called this a successful weekend because of their ability to raise awareness, but ultimately, the weekend represented a lot.

There was a great opportunity to be missed at the same time as the League praised the awards of its growth. There was frustration of the way things started and optimism with the way they finished.

In the end, the players made their message loud and clear with the six words spread over their shirts.

“Players are what builds this brand and this league,” said necklace. “There is no league without the players and the past, present, those who arrive. They are the ones who have put blood, perspiration and tears for the new money coming. We have the impression that we owe a piece of this pie that we helped to create.”