Consider this fair warning: WNBA labor negotiations are going to get ugly.
They’ve been headed that way for a while, certainly long before the players opted out of the current collective-bargaining agreement on Nov. 1. Anyone who follows WNBA news or keeps up with WNBA players on social media knows that.
So, here’s some friendly advice for both sides: Let it get ugly.
Get it all out in private meetings, in tweets, in first-person articles, in exclusive interviews. Be painfully honest. Bring the hard-to-hear facts and frustrations to the table. Talk tough, unflinchingly, even angrily about what’s not working and why. Fight fair, but don’t shy away from the fight.
The negotiations need to get ugly to clear the air and to give both sides a chance to push the reset button on a broken-down relationship. There’s too much history and too many hard feelings, too much mistrust and too many underlying issues to move forward any other way.
When NBA Commissioner Adam Silver tells espnW that “we seem to be missing a connection, a real engagement between the players and the league,” it’s a diplomatic way of describing the great divide between the two sides. Silver goes on to say that NBA players and their union have a “sense of real inclusion,” but that doesn’t appear to be the case with the WNBA. When Los Angeles Sparks forward Nneka Ogwumike writes in The Players’ Tribune that opting out is about getting “full transparency” and “information about where the league is as a business,” she highlights why the great divide exists and why the sense of real inclusion doesn’t.
The players sense they’re working from imperfect, incomplete information whenever talk turns to salaries and revenue. Meanwhile, the league insists the players’ association has the numbers. And since everything always comes back to the money, it’s easy to see how mistrust sets in, then sets the course toward an ugly labor war.
On the same day the players opted out, Mark Tatum, the NBA deputy commissioner who is overseeing the WNBA on an interim basis, appeared on ESPN’s “Outside the Lines.” (ESPN is the WNBA’s national broadcast partner.) Tatum said the WNBPA knows the league has consistently lost money, including $12 million last season.
When Tatum talks about “the financial realities of our business,” how the WNBA operates in the red, then mentions how seven women’s pro leagues have failed during the WNBA’s existence, it’s the obvious media strategy. It’s a reminder of who’s in control, who holds the power and the purse strings, who’s responsible for keeping the league afloat since it started 22 years ago. It also comes across as paternalistic.
Then again, one person’s paternalistic can be another person’s bottom-line business perspective.
Yet another reason to let it get ugly and clear the air.
Yes, the players are going after better pay, better working conditions and better marketing. And, yes, those are complicated, long-simmering economic issues, and they are enough to make negotiations contentious. But they cannot be separated from what the players really want: more respect. Or, as WNBA players’ union president Ogwumike writes, she wants a “league that believes in us as much as we believe in it.”
That league would pay better, treat players better and give players more say in WNBA decisions.
Aside from how to proceed with labor talks, the biggest looming decision is who will be the WNBA’s next president. Lisa Borders, the fourth person to hold that position, stepped down in October. Going back to his recent interview with espnW, Silver says all the right things about the search process. He talks about how “the players will be signing off on the next president” because “they need to believe in whoever the next president of this league is.” (Silver hopes a new president will be in place before the 2019 season, making the search process a good test for how the players and league can work together with transparency.)
Who believes in what is a big issue in the WNBA. That’s partly because of differing views on transparency. But it’s also because any investment of trust by the players and money by the league is not only a show of respect, but a sign of faith. It’s faith that the league can do better for all involved, that new approaches to marketing and corporate sponsorships can bring in more revenue, that changes to travel accommodations and player contract language can make life better for everyone.
But, again, before the players and the league get there, they need to have a good ol’ showdown.
If you’ve gotten this far and don’t believe letting things get ugly is good, if you think it comes with too much risk for the players, then consider how the U.S. women’s hockey team landed a new deal. The players threatened to boycott the 2017 world championships. If ever there was a good example of letting things get ugly, that’s it. The boycott threat combined with a savvy social media campaign (remember #BeBoldForChange?) proved remarkably effective. The players emerged with more annual compensation, better travel accommodations and promises to improve marketing, scheduling and development opportunities for young girls.
To be clear, this isn’t a push for any kind of boycott or even the threat of a work stoppage. That’s not the point. It’s about embracing the fight ahead. If the players and the league are ready and able to do that, there’s good reason to believe both sides will be better for it.
Shira Springer covers stories at the intersection of sports and society for programs on NPR and WBUR, writes a column on women’s sports for the Boston Globe and teaches journalism at Boston University. She can be reached at sbj.springer@gmail.com.
