The WNBA will expand its charter flights program—a point of contention during the offseason and a major priority for many of its biggest stars—for the upcoming 2023 campaign, the league announced Monday.
Charter flights, long grounded by insufficient revenue to pay for them, will now be provided for all postseason games, starting with this year’s WNBA playoffs, as well as a select number of regular-season contests. Private travel during the regular season will be accommodated when teams have back-to-back games scheduled. Teams competing in the Commissioner’s Cup championship game will also continue to be chartered, as was approved in 2022.
The WNBA, which will begin its 27th season next month, had previously allowed charter flights only in specific instances. Last season, the 12-team league expanded the program to include all WNBA Finals games as well as the Commissioner’s Cup championship but reiterated that it did not have the revenue to deliver the same for a full season.
While the steps announced for 2023 still fall short of player demands for private travel all season long, WNBA commissioner Cathy Engelbert said the league will “look to do more in the future,” as it continues to grow. Engelbert previously estimated that ditching commercial flights for private planes over the entirety of the WNBA’s season could cost as much as $30 million per year.
“We continue the hard work of transforming the business of the league, and the ability to expand this program is a direct result of that,” Engelbert said in a statement. “Since joining the league a few years ago, a goal of mine has been to enhance the overall player experience and, in that regard, make incremental improvements where we are able to do so and when we believe the economic model would support it for the long-term.”
Charter flights have long been a top player priority but were sidelined during the 2020 CBA negotiations in exchange for better pay and benefits increases. Engelbert said she was pleased with the league’s ability to make some progress this season.
WNBA superstar Breanna Stewart brought private travel back into the narrative during her free agency this offseason when she publicly pushed for a solution. The WNBA has held that it cannot afford the costs yet and is also against allowing owners to choose how their players travel, which it says could create competitive imbalances. That didn’t dissuade at least one from trying. Stewart ultimately signed with Joe Tsai’s New York Liberty, which was hit with a record $500,000 fine after Tsai chartered flights for his team in 2021.
Tsai has been one of the most vocal supporters of charter travel for WNBA teams since he bought the Liberty in 2019.
