Why Do So Few Teams Want to Host the WNBA All-Star Game?

For the second time in five years, the Chicago Sky will host the WNBA All-Star Game. 

When the announcement of the 2026 site was made in October, the questions were clear: Why Chicago again so soon? Why not one of the remaining original franchises—New York or Los Angeles—instead? 

Neither franchise bid. In fact, the Sky was the only franchise to express interest in hosting, according to multiple league sources.

Historically, the WNBA has had to pursue teams to host its exhibition game. A spokesperson for the WNBA told Front Office Sports the league held a bidding process for the 2026 game that all teams had the ability to participate in. 

Before Chicago was the only team to bid for 2026, the league had to recruit Indianapolis to host in 2025, and Las Vegas hosted three out of the four All-Star Games before 2024.

“We’re excited to do it,” Sky CEO Adam Fox told FOS. “It’s the goal to make Chicago the best place we’ve ever had a WNBA All-Star Game. That’s the kind of healthy competition in this game that everyone is interested in.” 

A spokesperson for the Sparks said the team ultimately chose to prioritize other major initiatives—the team is building a $150 million practice facility set to open in 2027 in El Segundo, Calif.—but will explore future opportunities to host the game. The Liberty declined to comment.

While traditionally the WNBA has had to seek out host teams, that wasn’t the case for the 2024 game. The Phoenix Mercury won that bid over three other interested parties, according to team president Vince Kozar. 

“The initial piece of it was—sort of raise your hand if you’re interested and then we’ll dive deeper on what your vision for it is, what you would do with it, why you want it, and if you have the infrastructure,” Kozar said. 

The Mercury had a compelling case for hosting, beginning with the fact they were slated to open their brand-new $100 million practice facility that would be included in part of the weekend’s festivities. The other consideration was that the 2024 season was likely to be three-time WNBA champion Diana Taurasi’s last. 

The game itself marked a turning point in the league in which players like Taurasi handed over the reins of the league to the next generation of stars, led by Indiana Fever guard Caitlin Clark. 

Every All-Star Game comes with an operating agreement that includes shared costs between the league and the host team. Mat Ishbia—who owns the Mercury and Suns and has a net worth of $9.2 billion according to Forbes—gave the mandate that the franchise needed to turn the weekend “on its head,” according to Kozar. 

That meant sparing no cost. That approach applied to the players’ accommodations, which were at a luxury resort instead of downtown hotels, and to the lavish parties and receptions the team hosted.

Kozar declined to put a figure on what it cost to throw the 2024 All-Star Game, but he said the team spent 200 times more than they did the last time they hosted in 2014. 

Since Phoenix hosted last year, the belief among a number of team executives is that hosting requires an owner willing to lose a substantial amount of money. 

The first WNBA All-Star Game was hosted by the Liberty in 1999 at Madison Square Garden. Sparks Hall of Fame center Lisa Leslie was crowned MVP. Over the next two decades, the game largely failed to break through to an audience beyond WNBA diehards; some league executives attributed that to the lack of fanfare outside of the game itself. 

Those executives say 2022 was a turning point, when the Sky hosted it less than a year removed from the franchise’s first title. It was the first year the league introduced WNBA Live, an outdoor fan festival open to the public, and more exclusive parties and brand events than in previous years. (There were still significant missed opportunities.)

But unlike the NBA, where bidding for All-Star weekend is fierce, there is still little competition to host.

In 2017, the Indiana Pacers made a spectacle of their All-Star bid, complete with 6-foot-9 Larry Bird cramming himself into an Indycar and driving down Fifth Avenue in New York to hand-deliver the franchise’s proposal to host the 2021 game to commissioner Adam Silver in person. The game ultimately was postponed until 2024 due to uncertainty surrounding the 2020–21 season as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Indianapolis’s bid for the 2024 WNBA All-Star Game did not require the same runway. 

Pacers Sports & Entertainment CEO Mel Raines recalled the WNBA contacting the team in 2024, letting them know that the league’s original plans had fallen through and asking whether the Fever were interested in hosting. (The league had never announced another host for 2025, and it did not answer questions about its plans.)

Raines estimated NBA All-Star weekend in Indianapolis in 2024—which included events at Lucas Oil Stadium as well as Gainbridge Fieldhouse—came with 197,000 tickets for events between Feb. 15 and 18, far more than WNBA All-Star weekend. 

The Fever made up for the lack of ticketed opportunities by turning downtown Indianapolis into their very own WNBA zone, complete with different branded activations that allowed fans to participate even if they didn’t have a ticket to the actual game on July 19. 

Raines declined to share the exact amount of money the Fever spent, but she said the organization added to the league’s mandated cost requirements with $1 million in legacy projects and about half a million dollars in community engagement projects. The organization is currently conducting an economic impact study, which Raines estimates will be significant. 

The explosion in the WNBA’s popularity over the last two years still includes the All-Star Game, though, even if teams are reluctant to host. The last two have been sold out, and are the two most-watched All-Star Games in league history, with more than two million people tuning in last season and a whopping 3.4 million in 2024—more than quadruple the previous year.

The 2026 All-Star Game will be played at the United Center on July 25, giving the league an opportunity to make attendance history as the Chicago arena is the largest in the NBA with a capacity of nearly 21,000. WNBA Live will be hosted about six miles southeast at McCormick Place. 

Since the first WNBA All-Star Game, only four franchises without shared NBA ownership have taken on hosting the event: the Connecticut Sun, Las Vegas Aces, Seattle Storm, and the Sky. The Atlanta Dream, Dallas Wings, and Sparks have never hosted the game, along with the expansion Golden State Valkyries. 

Kozar, the Mercury president, said planning the 2024 All-Star weekend in Phoenix was made easier because of his franchise’s NBA resources.

“A ton of props to Chicago for what they’re undertaking,” Kozar said. “If we didn’t have the resources of our entire organization and Player 15 Group, we would not have been able to put on the All-Star Game the size and scope of which we did. To do that as an independent team, that’s a massive undertaking manpower-wise.”