WNBA contract dispute could delay start of Portland Fire season

Officials with the WNBA say a new labor deal must be in place by Tuesday to avoid disruptions to the season set to start in May – and leaders with the Portland Fire have an added concern: The Fire need a labor deal in place before building a roster of players.

In the past, expansion teams have had five months or more to acquire players through an expansion draft, trades with other teams, and the rookie draft. The timeline for the Portland Fire and the other expansion team, the Toronto Tempo, will be extremely truncated, even if the sides agree on a deal immediately.

The two sides still remain far apart on how the WNBA should share its rapidly increasing revenue with the players. The union for the players has already authorized a strike if needed, though both sides say they hope to avoid one.

Here’s more on how labor talks could affect the Portland Fire’s first season.

First, what’s going on with the labor negotiations?

No matter what, WNBA players are going to get paid a lot more than the current range of about $66,000 to $249,000 per year.

But there’s tension over how the league will share its revenue, which has gone up significantly in recent years. Players want to see a model that’s closer to what the NBA has, where a portion of total revenue is shared. In the NBA, about half of the league’s total income is doled out to players in their salaries.

League officials have proposed a system that would take revenue minus expenses and dole out that amount to players when their salary checks are cut.

How does that affect the Portland Fire’s ability to build a roster?

Without a contract in place, the league won’t run an expansion draft. That’s how new teams like the Fire pick players who are already in the league. An agreement also has to be reached before teams can start trading players with each other and before the rookie draft.

The WNBA just went through this process last year when the Golden State Valkyries joined the league as the first expansion team since 2008.

Erin Lim is a reporter for KALW in San Francisco. She hosts the podcast Bounce, which covered the first season of the Valkyries from just before the time the team tipped off in May 2025.

“They were able to do a draft in December of 2024,” Lim said. “And we are way past that right now.”

Lim said by the time the rookie draft happened in April, fans of the Valkyries already knew who some of the team’s core players could be.

“The Valkyries were set up with, it seemed like, a pretty set roster of different names,” Lim said. “People that have had all kinds of different backgrounds in who they played for, and if they had titles, if they didn’t – who they were in the W at this point.”

Players still can – and do – get cut or traded before the season starts, Lim said. But knowing who might make the team still gave fans another thing to be excited about.

Will the negotiation talks push back the start of the season?

Maybe. First, teams would cancel preseason games – which Lim said were important in building fan engagement when the Valkyries launched.

“I went to the first preseason game, and it felt like it was a playoff game,” Lim said. “It was sold out. You would have never known that that was the Valkyries’ first time playing at Chase Center.”

Beyond the potential loss of preseason games, the WNBA has not said what will happen if there is still no agreement past March 10.

What can the leaders of the Portland Fire do in the meantime?

Despite labor talks, the owners of the Portland Fire have been quite busy.

Siblings Lisa Bhathal Merage and Alex Bhathal own the team through their investment firm RAJ Sports. The pair also own the city’s NWSL team, the Portland Thorns. RAJ Sports landed a partnership with healthcare company Kaiser Permanente, and together they’re building a major new practice facility in Hillsboro for the Thorns and Fire.

Leaders for the team have also built up their business and coaching staff, including bringing on a General Manager who previously worked for the Valkyries.

How are fans in Oregon feeling?

Fans are ready for professional women’s basketball to return to Portland. The first iteration of the Fire played in Oregon from 2000 through 2002, and at the time drew big crowds. For the reignited team, more than 15,000 season tickets have already been sold.

Plus, Oregonians have a long history of supporting women athletes.

“It’s just sort of been the way our culture is in Oregon,” said Lauren Anderson, head of the Warsaw Sports Business Center at the University of Oregon. “I don’t really know why or how, but I think it’s a lot of liberal people who are like, ‘Everybody should have the right to play’ – and have really supported it.”