Why the WNBA's Expanded Schedule is a Mixed Blessing for the Fire

📍PORTLAND, Ore. — The Fire's first season in the WNBA comes in the midst of an aggressive expansion push from the league. They're one of three teams that has come into the league in the past two seasons, joining the Golden State Valkyries last year and Toronto Tempo this year. And there are three more teams on the way before the end of the decade: Cleveland in 2028, Detroit in 2029 and Philadelphia in 2030.

With this in mind, along with a lucrative new set of media-rights deals and a new CBA that drastically increases player salaries and benefits, the WNBA announced on Wednesday that beginning next season, their regular-season schedule will increase from 44 games to 50, with the potential of a further increase to 52 games starting in 2029.

In this week's announcement, WNBA commissioner Cathy Engelbert said the expanded schedule "reflects our commitment to growing the game and creating more opportunities for fans to watch the best players in the world and experience the extraordinary talent and competition that define the WNBA."

Fire head coach Alex Sarama doesn't entirely see it that way.

"There's two sides to it," he said before Portland's comeback win over the Seattle Storm on Wednesday. "I always want what's best for the players. So more exposure for this incredible league, yes, we want that. It's a great thing for the league. But the other side is, I'm always so concerned about performance and health. I've spoken a lot about that this year. It's such a focus of ours, keeping the players healthy. We want to sustain and extend their careers. I think it's really hard to do that when it's an even more-condensed schedule."

The WNBA's calendar isn't nearly as static as the NBA's is, and often changes year-to-year. This spring, the league and players' union managed to complete a new CBA and start training camp and the season on time, but the schedule will have a two-week break at the beginning of September while many players—likely including several Fire players—play for their national teams in the FIBA World Cup. There will be a similar break in the schedule in 2028 for the Summer Olympics.

The new CBA allows the league a lot of wiggle room to extend the schedule at either end from its current May-to-October structure. Under the new agreement, training camp is allowed to begin as early as April 1, and the postseason can extend as late as Nov. 21.

It's unlikely that the league will extend it out that full length in the beginning. As it is, the mid-April start of training camp is already a tight turnaround from the draft, which typically happens just days after the end of the NCAA Tournament, which many of the players picked in the draft will have just finished playing in.

But it could still affect players who play in other leagues during the WNBA offseason, be it Unrivaled, Athletes Unlimited, domestic leagues in other countries or the soon-to-launch Project B.

"My main concern, in all honesty, is the players who still play internationally," Sarama said. "When you're getting that long club season and then coming straight to the W, that would perhaps make any health issues even more apparent."

As it is, the Fire's two most important players, Bridget Carleton and Carla Leite, came late to the franchise's first-ever training camp because they were finishing up overseas commitments. This year's first-round pick, Spanish point guard Iyana Martín, might face a similar delay in making her WNBA debut next season if she plays overseas again this coming winter.

This exact conflict was likely by design, as the WNBA league office and team owners want players to prioritize playing in the U.S. over playing in other leagues. Now that the WNBA is paying players something closer to what they should be making than the laughably low salaries even the best players made under the old CBA, their preference is for players not to play year-round in other leagues and risk injury.

"We have an incredible performance department here, so I have to trust them," Sarama said. "But we're going to continue to be very intentional and continue to dive into that. That is one of the keys in the modern era. Player health and availability is really the number-one factor determining winning and team record. It's an important issue."

Already, much of the Fire's program is built around just that. Sarama has completely eliminated morning shootarounds on game days, which have been a staple for decades in both the WNBA and NBA, because he believes players are better served by saving their energy for the game itself.

And he plays a deep rotation without relying too heavily on his best players. This season, no Fire player is averaging over 30 minutes per game, and only Carleton (29.3 minutes) is above 25. Golden State, Connecticut and Seattle are the only other teams in the league that don't have at least one player playing at least 30 minutes. Most have multiple.

For Portland, that's by design, not just to sustain the high-energy play style Sarama and GM Vanja Černivec want the team to play, but to protect players from overuse injuries.

"You see it in our whole program and how we rotate and the short stints," he said. "The reason we play 10 [players] is the player health, and the idea of giving it your all in your stint. Whether you play three, four or five minutes, the idea is you give it everything and then you come back to the bench and you're ready for your next one. We're at the top of a league in a lot of metrics like sprint speed, decelerations, load outputs. We are working really hard physically, and it shows. Adding more pace offensively is going to help us."

The expanded schedule of games may also lead to a problem that the NBA has faced for decades: during the season, teams rarely have time to practice because there are so many games and travel days.

For Sarama, whose Constraints-Led Approach is based so heavily on unconventional practice methods, this is something he worries about losing.

"You know me, I like my practice time," Sarama joked. "I have noticed a difference this year in the quality of play in our games [following] practices, because it's such a good opportunity to tighten things up."

In anticipation of the expanded schedule, and as a way to create more jobs, the new WNBA CBA introduced two developmental roster spots in addition to each team's 12 regular roster spots. Similar to the NBA's two-way contracts, these players can only appear in a few games before they have to be converted to standard WNBA contracts.

So far, the Fire have only made sporadic use of their two developmental spots. Earlier in the season, Frieda Bühner and Holly Winterburn were both signed as developmental players, but both were converted well before they hit their 12-game limit. Portland re-signed Jordan Harrison, who they waived after opening night, to one of the newly open developmental spots, and she has yet to be activated for one game of her 12-game quota. Their second spot remains open.

That may not be the case next year, if there are more games and fewer practice days for coaches to balance minutes and rotations.

"It's even more important, how those spots are used going forward in the future," Sarama said. "The way I look at it is, we are trying to do some very specific things offensively and defensively. So the more time you have to get players acclimatized to the playbook, it really makes a difference. Everything we've started this year process-wise, with the minutes, I think will be even more important next year. Maybe the competitive advantage becomes greater because players are fresher."

The WNBA's recent explosion in mainstream popularity is resulting in some things the league should have had decades ago: higher salaries and more games on national TV.

Sarama just hopes that the league's commitment to keeping the best players on the court keeps pace with the financial growth.

"I do want what's best for this league and the players with business and exposure and all of that, so it's two sides," he said. "As a league, we've really got to keep investing in player health and performance and pay attention to all these metrics."