WNBA Free Agency Opens Monday With 100+ Free Agents
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- WNBA and the WNBPA agreed free agency will begin Monday, the league announced Sunday evening, with a structured week-long window: designation period (qualifying offers, core player designations) Monday-Tuesday, negotiations Wednesday-Friday, and signings starting Saturday.
- Over 100 players are free agents and will benefit from the massive salary bumps featured in the new CBA, per the league's announcement.
- The new CBA was verbally agreed to on March 18 and ratified a week later, but the long-form document is still being completed — meaning the league and union are moving into free agency without a finalized written agreement in hand.
- The WNBA calendar is tightly compressed: the draft is set for April 13, training camps begin April 19, preseason games April 25, and the regular season opens May 8 — giving teams roughly three weeks from the draft to be roster-ready.
- ESPN's Alexa Philippou characterized the new CBA as a 'transformational deal,' a framing that underscores how the salary and structural changes could reshape roster construction league-wide as free agency opens.
Why it matters: With 100-plus free agents and the draft just days later, WNBA teams have a compressed window to negotiate and sign under a new CBA whose written terms aren't even finalized yet — meaning players and front offices are operating on verbal agreement terms while making the league's most consequential roster moves in years.
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