Napheesa Collier and Cathy Engelbert show how ugly CBA negotiations could get
What can MLB learn from the WNBA ahead of their upcoming collective bargaining agreement negotiations?
Despite being in the thick of the postseason, one storyline is still casting a shadow over Major League Baseball–the negotiations for a new collective bargaining agreement. The current CBA is set to expire on Dec. 1, 2026. If the league does not come to an agreement with the MLB Player’s Association before then, the 2027 season could be put in jeopardy.
The WNBA is also going through a similar situation. Their CBA expires in just under a month on Oct. 31 and they have yet to agree on a new deal.
Napheesa Collier, the vice president of the WNBA and one of the league’s biggest stars and most well-known figures, made headlines when she read a statement during her media availability on Tuesday after her team, the Minnesota Lynx, were eliminated from the playoffs, directly calling out WNBA commissioner Cathy Engelbert.
(Full video of Collier’s comments courtesy of Zone Coverage’s Andrew Dukowitz)
“We have the best league in the world. We have the best fans in the world. But we have the worst leadership in the world,” Collier said. “Year after year, the only thing that remains consistent is the lack of accountability from our leaders.”
Collier criticized Engelbert for her lack of response to officiating issues, overall lapses in communication and treatment of star players, especially Caitlin Clark. As a part of her statement, Collier shared a conversation she had with Engelbert about Clark and overall concerns about low salaries across the league.
“Her response was, ‘[Clark] should be grateful. She makes $16 million off the court because without the platform that the WNBA gives her, she wouldn’t make anything.’ And in that same conversation, she told me, ‘Players should be on their knees, thanking their lucky stars for the media rights deal that I got them.’”
Now, how does this relate to baseball? This season, in preparation for the upcoming CBA negotiations, MLB commissioner Rob Manfred visited clubhouses to have in-person conversations with players across the league in order to share his side of many contentious issues, including a new media rights deal, potential changes to free agency and the infamous salary cap.
“The strategy is to get directly to the players,” Manfred said per The Athletic’s Evan Drellich. “I don’t think the leadership of this union is anxious to lead the way to change. So we need to energize the workforce in order to get them familiar with or supportive of the idea that maybe change in the system could be good for everybody.”
Those conversations were met with varying levels of enthusiasm. Most notably, Manfred had an especially hostile interaction with Bryce Harper when he spoke with the Phillies.
When Manfred began speaking about the league’s economics, Harper became angry, believing that Manfred was implying that he wanted to introduce a salary cap. According to ESPN’s Jeff Passan, Harper approached Manfred and said, “If you want to speak about that, you can get the fuck out of our clubhouse.” Manfred reportedly responded by saying that he was “not going to get the fuck out of here.”
While the details of Manfred’s interaction with Harper and the Phillies were reported publicly, they happened behind closed doors. Harper did not do anything as drastic as Collier did by reading a prepared statement at a press conference. However, Harper is certainly not alone in his feelings about Manfred, how he is handling the upcoming negotiations and the overall state of baseball.
The WNBA is dealing with different, but similarly polarizing issues. Thrust into a national spotlight with the incredible popularity of new superstars like Clark, Angel Reese and Paige Bueckers, there are more eyes on the WNBA than ever before. After Collier’s comments, her peers around the league spoke up in near-unanimous support. Media members, including Stephen A. Smith, who works for WNBA league partner ESPN, called on Engelbert to retire.
Collier’s unprecedented public comments could be a harbinger of what is to come. Once MLB’s Dec. 1, 2026 gets closer, members of the MLBPA’s executive subcommittee, who will be voted in for a new two-year term at the start of the upcoming offseason, could look towards their WNBA counterparts and publicly apply pressure to Manfred.
What would it look like if, say, instead of keeping it inside the clubhouse, Harper aired out his grievances with Manfred during next season’s postseason media availability in front of the national media, like what Collier did. If Manfred continues to try and drive a wedge between players and MLBPA leadership and manipulate players into believing that a salary cap would be in their best interests, he could find himself in a similar spot to Engelbert.
While Manfred has been making a clear effort to appeal to the general public, like by doing interviews with Pat McAfee and Barstool Sports, which is more than Engelbert, it may not be enough if some of the biggest names in baseball publicly take a stand against him.
The relationship between the players and Manfred is already tense. The situation in the WNBA has shown it can get significantly worse.
For more from us on Manfred and the ongoing CBA negotiations, check out videos from Trevor May on the Harper/Manfred situation, a potential salary cap and Manfred’s plan on speaking directly with players.