What is the reason for the firing of WNBA coaches? 7 franchises are hiring

In the next few weeks, the WNBA’s general managers and head coaches will gather for their annual fall competition meeting to review the 2024 season and discuss potential changes for the upcoming year. In previous meetings, enough coaches participated to theoretically play five-on-five. This year there will barely be enough to play three-on-three.

Nearly 60 percent of last season’s WNBA head coaches lost their jobs this offseason, making this a busy and historic fall. The seven changes are the most for one cycle in league history.

Three franchises parted ways with coaches (Tanisha Wright, Christie Sides and Stephanie White) despite making the playoffs. Sides helped the Fever increase their win total by seven games in Caitlin Clark’s record-setting rookie season. White was one year away from winning Coach of the Year and just four quarters away from a WNBA Finals berth. Just two years removed from a Finals appearance with the Sun, Curt Miller was out after rebuilding the Los Angeles Sparks roster.

Each coaching change has its own context, but some stakeholders draw a through line among those pointing to the bigger stakes on the line as the league grows at record speeds.

“You would never see this total without the changing WNBA,” said one current general manager, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the person was not authorized to speak on league matters. “The amount we have right now is partly because all eyes are on the W. Owners, who were indifferent before care now.”

The WNBA is in an unprecedented period of growth. It’s part of the cultural sports consciousness like never before, coming off the most-watched Finals in 25 years, the most-watched regular season on ESPN and viewership at the All-Star Game and draft. A new landmark media rights deal worth more than $2 billion will take effect in 2026. The expansion franchise’s value is significantly higher than it was even 18 months ago with the next generation of stars like Paige Bueckers and JuJu Watkins on the way.

Some suggest that boom is affecting coaching stability.

“When an owner’s thumb is on a scale, the first thing to go to is the coach,” said Fred Williams, a former WNBA head coach who speaks to the current coaching climate.

The shooting marks a notable change in the WNBA. But the reality is that makes the WNBA like virtually every other sports league.

Some owners have looked at their franchise and probably sought change. And who did they consider useless?

“The most volatile place for it, when people want change, is the head coach across all professional sports,” the general manager said.

The unfortunate reality for head coaches across various sports is that wins don’t always translate to stability. Recent NBA history has seen coaches fired after winning Coach of the Year (Dwane Casey), within a year of reaching the conference finals (Darvin Ham) and two after winning the Larry O’Brien Trophy (Mike Budenholzer). Still, the NBA and G League have become minefields for WNBA replacements; Aces coach Becky Hammon and Mercury coach Nate Tibbetts notably left NBA assistant positions for head roles in the WNBA.

For WNBA coaches, the league is no longer an oasis where sustained success will lead to job security.

“Are we in unprecedented times? Are we in this space where people want to exploit and they feel like they need something different?” said Cheryl Reeve, Minnesota Lynx coach and president of basketball operations. “It can be kind of … the energy you see from these leaders making these decisions.”

Some of the changes may not be unjustified. League sources suggested some franchises are trying to get ahead of the WNBA’s biggest free agency yet in 2026 by trying to build a strong foundation this offseason. (Only two players not on rookie-scale contracts are signed to contracts that expired last year.)

The wave of coaching changes has spanned more than a month. Some teams that missed the playoffs (Dallas and Washington) waited more than four weeks between the end of their seasons and the announcement of their move. Their coaches sat in exit meetings. That begs the question: Does each team have a clear plan for their next step?

Let’s answer that question with another: Who will these teams hire?

Although there is prestige in being one of only 12 – 13, come next spring – WNBA head coaches, compensation for WNBA coaches ranges widely. The price for this offseason was about $350,000 to just over $1 million annually, league sources said. Contracts are often shorter than college coaching deals. This cycle was a reminder that job stability is often lacking — six of the seven coaching changes involved coaches who had been on the job for two seasons or less.

Additionally, in recent seasons, coaches have seen their power across organizations diminish. A short time ago, another shift occurred in the coaching ranks: WNBA franchises began to move away from a dual coach-general manager role.

Reeve, the league’s longest-tenured coach, has the final decision-making power in player personnel, but she is the only active coach to hold both positions. The move to split GM and coaching responsibilities into two positions signaled that ownership groups were interested in expanding their front offices and investing in top decision-making talent. It was a realization that the jobs are too big and important for one person. But that change also led to more coaching responsibility (or at least made a coach more vulnerable, depending on one’s perspective). What coach would want to fire himself from both roles?

This is not the WNBA of yesteryear, where, as one general manager put it, “you can just be a good person and survive five to 10 years.”

It’s not even survival-of-the-fittest anymore.

It’s a new era in more ways than one. What is happening is a historic anomaly in the WNBA. But it is not across the modern sports landscape. For coaches looking for stability, the WNBA is no longer a hiding place.

— Athletics‘s Sabreena Merchant contributed to this report.

(Photos by Teresa Weatherspoon and Christie Sides: Patrick McDermott/Getty Images, Erica Denhoff/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)