The Athletic reporting that NWSL commissioner, Jessica Berman, threatened to fine the Kansas City Current over missing the broadcast window for their home game on August 16 due to extreme heat, lead me to take a closer look at the league's policies for extreme heat, which lead me to the discover that it has been changed. 

This is the link to the NWSL 2025 Competition Rules & Regulations that is currently linked on the NWSL website. 

The extreme heat policy starts on page eight and in part reads:

During the Delay

A. Similar to a severe weather delay, the match will not start or resume until it is safe to do so as outlined by the procedures below.

B. The Fourth Official will take another WBGT measurement 30 minutes prior to the scheduled start of the match.

○ If the WBGT measurement reads < 92.3°F/33.5°C, warm-ups may begin.

○ If the WBGT reading continues to be ≥92.3°F/33.5°C, the match will continue to be delayed.

C. A WBGT measurement will then be taken every 15 minutes at the kickoff spot, until it is deemed safe to play, < 92.3°F/33.5°C, or until such time has passed that the League decides to postpone the match. 

○ The Fourth Official will take the second WBGT reading immediately after the conclusion of pre-match warmups. The same procedures above should be followed. 

○ If play is allowed, the Fourth Official will take the third WBGT reading immediately following the Referee’s whistle to end the 1st half of play. Again, the same procedures above should be followed. 

The above is a change from the previously published 2025 Competition Rules & Regulations (and still available online if one has that specific link saved).

That part of the previously version reads (again on page eight):

During the Delay

A. Similar to a severe weather delay, the match will not start or resume until it is safe to do so as outlined by the procedures below.

B. The Fourth Official will take another WBGT measurement 15 minutes prior to the scheduled start of the match. Follow the same procedure as above, should the WBGT reading meet or exceed 95 degrees Fahrenheit.

• If the WBGT temperature reads below 92.3 degrees Fahrenheit, warm-ups may begin.

C. Following the reading 15 minutes prior to the start of the match, should the delay continue, a WBGT measurement will be taken every 30 minutes at the kickoff spot, until it is deemed safe to play, below 92.3 degrees Fahrenheit, or until such time has passed that the League decides to postpone the match. 

• In the event a WBGT measurement is below the 92.3 degrees Fahrenheit threshold by 1 degree (i.e., 91.3 degrees Fahrenheit), it will be the Fourth Official in conjunction with the home club’s Team Physician with feedback from visiting team medical personnel, operations, officials and both technical staffs, to make the ultimate decision if and when play is allowed to resume. 

ii. The Referees will take the second WBGT reading immediately after the conclusion of pre-match warmups. Follow the same procedures as above should the WBGT reading meet or exceed 92.3 degrees Fahrenheit. 

iii. The referees will take the third WBGT reading immediately following the referee’s whistle to end the 1st half of play. Again, follow the same procedures as above should the WBGT measurement meet or exceed 92.3 degrees Fahrenheit.

The newer version changes "B." to "30 minutes" from "15 minutes" in the previous version, while also taking out the mention of "95 degrees Fahrenheit" (presumably that was and error and was never supposed to be in the policy because the threshold is 92.3 degrees Fahrenheit), but the truly flabbergasting change comes in "C". 

The previous version says, "In the event a WBGT measurement is below the 92.3 degrees Fahrenheit threshold by 1 degree (i.e., 91.3 degrees Fahrenheit), it will be the Fourth Official in conjunction with the home club’s Team Physician with feedback from visiting team medical personnel, operations, officials and both technical staffs, to make the ultimate decision if and when play is allowed to resume." The newer version takes this out in its entirety, which removes the discretion that the previous version afforded to the two teams that will actually be playing the game. 

I do not know when this change in policy occurred, but I have a suspicion that it was after the Current's game on August 16. Berman threatened to fine the Current for "breaking protocol" only after the Current didn't accept that the Wet Bulb Globe Temperature (WBGT) briefly went under the leagues threshold of 92.3 degrees Fahrenheit because of a passing cloud (WBGT is a measurement that takes temperature, humidity, wind speed, and sunlight into account), and so they took another reading 15 minutes later because anyone with a brain and who thought player safety was the most important factor knew that the temperature was not going to say under the threshold. That reading had the WBGT at 95.6 degrees Fahrenheit, which led to the game being delayed again, and ultimately the game not starting until after the broadcast window had past.

There have been too many times in the past year that have I said that Berman needs to be fired.

• The NWSL and the San Diego Wave FC are currently being sued by six former staff of the Wave, including because the league signed off on the Wave employing a sexual predator (said sexual predator was eventually fired after a second Jane Doe came forward), and both the league and club are benefiting from the rippling silencing that has been caused by Jill Ellis' defamation lawsuit against Brittany Alvarado (a former Wave employee who blew the whistle on rampant misconduct occurring at the Wave), meanwhile Berman went around calling Ellis "iconic." The Wave (under new ownership) also recently announced that they gave Mark Carr a promotion, despite him being a former Ellis’ toady (just like Graeme Abel and Matt Potter) and that former players and their parents have spoken out against his treatment of players when he was the head coach at the University of Oklahoma.
• The NWSL allowed Bay FC head coach, Albertin Montoya, to continue to coach while he was under investigation for misconduct, and then let him off the hook when their investigation found that "Montoya caused players harm but did not violate NWSL harassment policy." This was after the club was going to hire Graeme Abel despite that he resigned in October 2024 from the University of Oregon amid an awful on-field record and reporting from The Oregonian that he made players feel “shamed, demeaned, and verbally abused” to the point that multiple players felt suicidal. Abel likely was give the job due to his connection to Matt Potter, who himself was fired as the head coach of the Kansas City Current in 2023 with such urgency that it was done on the same day the club had a game. The Current's press release said that they were parting ways with Potter "related to issues around his leadership and employment responsibilities." In a later press conference, the Kansas City Star reported that then Current GM Camille Ashton (who now is the GM at the Wave) said, "We felt that this was having a significant impact on our culture and on our players and staff." While Ashton did not give specifics, she did also say that Potter's firing did not have to do with his relationship with players.
• Former NWSL player Carly Nelson revealed she quit playing soccer because of the abusive environment of the Utah Royals, and later she tweeted, "In terms of my experience and a reminder - Utah didn’t do a single thing to even remotely take accountability and still hasn’t to this day. They took my career away! They swept it all under the rug with hopes it would disappear like many other clubs have done and are doing."
• The Denver Summit announced Curt Johnson as their GM (who had a hand in hiring now disgraced Paul Riley without proper due diligence) and Peyton Manning as a part of their ownership group (who, though he has always tried to downplay it, sexually harassed an athletic trainer while in college - including putting his rectum and testicles on her face).
• The North Carolina Courage just perplexingly and non-transparently fired Sean Nahas (who coached under Paul Riley), though the Courage could not outdo the Houston Dash when it comes to perplexing and non-transparent coaching vacancies. If you put your ear to the ground you can hear whispers of the actual reasons the Courage and Dash found themselves without a head coach - and the real reasons do not speak well of a post Yates Report NWSL. 
• In the most high profile incident of them all, play was continued after Savy King collapsed on the field and needed chest compressions before being taken to the hospital where it was later discovered that she had a heart defect.

For a commissioner who was brought on in order to help cleanse the league of its past sins, Berman’s tenure has felt like a revolving door of déjà vu. If my suspicion about when this change with the extreme heat policy occurred is correct and especially if it was made unilaterally with the NWSLPA input, then this needs to be the straw that breaks the camel’s back.