Alexa PhilippouFeb 27, 2026, 08:49 PM ETCloseCovers women's college basketball and the WNBA Previously covered UConn and the WNBA Connecticut Sun for the Hartford Courant Stanford graduate and Baltimore native with further experience at the Dallas Morning News, Seattle Times and Cincinnati EnquirerFollow on XMultiple AuthorsEmailPrintOpen Extended ReactionsThe Women's National Basketball Players Association submitted a new counterproposal to the WNBA on Friday evening with some concessions on revenue share and housing, a source familiar with the collective bargaining negotiations told ESPN. In the new CBA proposal, the players union is asking for players to receive 26% of gross revenue (defined as revenue before deducting expenses) over the lifetime of the agreement, with the salary cap in Year 1 of the deal (about $9.5 million) unchanged from its previous offer. The revenue share split is down from 27.5% of gross revenue as proposed in the WNBPA's Feb. 17 proposal, a change that a source said amounts to nearly $100 million in reductions on revenue share. The new proposal also contained tweaks to the union's housing offerings: Previously, the players asked that teams continue to provide housing to players in the first several years of the new deal, but that in later years, teams will no longer be obligated to provide it for players making at least 80% of the maximum salary, on multiyear deals and receiving full salary protection. In the new proposal, the union struck the multiyear component and lowered the salary threshold to 75% for which players would no longer be obligated to receive team-provided housing. The two sides are still negotiating the years of service limit for developmental players -- a new feature of this CBA with each team now expected to have two developmental player spots. The union is now proposing a year of service limit of six after originally asking for no experience limit for those players, a source said, while the league's latest proposal suggested four or five years of service based on minutes played. The WNBPA's counterproposal comes one week after the league submitted one of its own.
