WNBA commissioner Cathy Engelbert received 2-word chant at All-Star Game

The chant comes amid tense negotiations on a new collective barganing agreement between the WNBA and the players. The current CBA is set to expire on Oct. 31, 2025, and the players have made it clear that they are looking for a bigger slice of the pie in the next CBA.

Notably, all of the WNBA All-Stars (including Caitlin Clark) showed up wearing warmup shirts before the game that read, “Pay us what you owe us.” The move came after face-to-face talks between the WNBA and the players this week that Collier, who is the 2025 MVP frontrunner as well as the vice president of the WNBPA, described as “disappointing.”

The WNBA is still deeply unprofitable as a league, and the NBA continues to actively subsidize it in order for it to survive. But the WNBA’s overall revenue has recently surged thanks to the interest in and popularity of the Indiana Fever star Clark (with a impending $2.2 billion media rights deal set to kick in by 2026 too). Both sides will have to navigate those competing factors in order to strike a deal on a new CBA and avoid a potential work stoppage.