WNBA Commissioner Cathy Engelbert leveraged the league’s new popularity to forge a $2.2 billion, 11-year media deal.
Photographer: Bess Adler/BloombergWNBA Standoff Pits Players Who Want More Pay Against League’s Chief
The WNBA has nurtured its stars and landed a $2.2 billion media deal. Commissioner Cathy Engelbert, a former Deloitte CEO, must now find peace with players who want more.
As WNBA Commissioner, Cathy Engelbert has transformed women’s basketball into a business juggernaut — but a standoff over how much players should share in the league’s growth could threaten her leadership, and her legacy.
Engelbert, a 60-year-old former chief executive officer of the accounting giant Deloitte who took the once-struggling league’s top job in 2019, has been widely credited with steering the pro basketball league through the tumult of the Covid-19 pandemic and into a prosperous new era.