The WNBA plans to commit $ 50 million in the next two years to provide a full -time charter flight service for their teams during the season, the Cathy Engelbert commissioner announced Tuesday in a movement that addresses years of players’ security concerns.
Engelbert said in a meeting with the sports editors that the League will launch a charter program “as soon as we can obtain airplanes in some places.” She said it is projected that it will cost around $ 25 million per year during the next two seasons.
That means that no longer safety lines, bodyguards in public spaces, narrow legs or scales for professional athletes who have been pressing during a better trip long before Caitlin Clark’s celebrity brought a newly discovered interest to the league.
The president of the National Association of Women’s Basketball Players, Nneka Ogwumike, described the “transformation” movement and accredited the collaboration between the WNBPA and the League.
“Our league is growing, the demand for female basketball is growing,” said Ogwumike. “That means more eyes about us, which is what we want, but that means more protection against the organization for which we play, all the W for which we play.
“Flegration flights are not only a security measure, most importantly, and obviously what means to play a game and go home and rest and recover and be elite athletes that we try to be every night when we spend in This court.
Players such as the Minnesota Lynx Napheesa Collier striker and Phoenix Mercury Natasha Cloud Guard emphasized the importance of security following the league’s decision.
“All these players and these faces are becoming so popular that it is really about that as much as about recovery,” said Collier, pointing out how last season Brittney Griner was harassed by what the WNBA called a “provocative” while traveling commercial .
Clark attracted the attention walking through the airport with his new teammates for Indiana Fever for a preseason game with the Dallas Wings last week. That exhibition was exhausted and fans were eager to enter.
“Above all, I think it’s the security of our players,” said Cloud. “We have an excellent example with BG in our team that needs to be safe. At airports, it’s like madness. You see Caitlin Clark walking through airports, the people who follow it, the people who try to touch it, put photos. It’s just that it is a security measure, from beginning to end.
The WNBA had already announced plans to pay charter flights once again for the playoffs, as well as for consecutive games during the next season. The League presented that program last year, spending around $ 4 million on charter flights. Engelbert said that at that time the League needed to be in the right financial position to make full -time charter flights.
The WNBA has never been more popular thanks to rookies like Clark, who helped the NCAA to reach their best audience in history for women’s basketball, with almost 19 million fans watching the game for the title, along with Angel Reese, who, who He went to the Met gala on Monday night and Cameron Brink.
The Minnesota coach, Cheryl Reeve, said it is no longer a business as always: it is time for the league, franchises and female sports to be innovative.
“We have had moments in the league,” Reeve said, qualifying the current impulse as a tsunami. “But this is clearly a movement. And if you think it is not, you will be left behind.”
The WNBA teams have also been transferring games against Clark and Indiana to larger sands due to the greatest demand. The defending champion Las Vegas Aces became the first WNBA team to sell their seasonal tickets assigned in March after leading the assistance of the League in 2023.
Flights have been a continuous problem for WNBA that attracted more attention last year when the League began working with Mercury and Griner after the 10-month arrest of the All-Star Center in Russia.
“Our security is being taken seriously now, finally. In no world should not be a priority,” Griner said. “If we want to be the league we want to be and we have the respect we have, it comes with some risks. Sometimes people want to approach you and they are not people you want, so I’m glad we don’t have to deal with that anymore” .
The League had not allowed the teams to wear charter flights, except when they had consecutive games.
That forced players like Breanna Stewart, the 6 -foot 4 lead for the freedom of New York, to overcome other travelers on commercial flights to fit in their assigned window seat. WNBA players also had to recover not only their own luggage, but also to support travel days that could extend 13 hours with delays.
Charter flights will allow WNBA players to go through private air terminals directly to buses or their own cars when they return home. Avoiding scales will also help with recovery between games, which is even more crucial with the schedule of this season affected by the Olympic Games.
WNBA coaches and players were waiting for details about charter flights on Tuesday.
Stewart spoke with journalists through Zoom just before the commissioner spoke in New York. Stewart shared on social networks a plane emoji with an interrogation sign for the attention of the WNBA account.
Las Vegas coach Becky Hammon, whose ACES already had security to protect the players, knows what will make everyone ecstatic.
“Everyone is very happy that they don’t have to be in security lines so much, or so long,” said Hammon.
The two -time MVP of the WNBA A’JA Wilson, who now has an approval agreement with Gatorade, said that the growth of the female game has been a “whirlwind” that was just a matter of time. Wilson said it depends on players and teams put the best product on the court with so many people watching.
“That is what continues to bring more eyes and more people and more investors, and then we end with charter flights, and then things are turning off and people are turning, and now we are having a great time,” Wilson said.
Cloud said players will continue to try to “push the limits” so that future generations find the league in an even better place.
“Obviously, the CBA is up after the season, so we, as a league, as a brotherhood we are going to decide what our most important problems are and that is why we will continue fighting,” he said. “Our work is not only to do this league and continue pushing this league forward, but ensure that the next generation of players, do not have to fight the same fights, which enter a league that is well established and ready for them “
Kevin Pelton’s information from ESPN and Associated Press was used in this report.
