NBA Return Gaining Momentum
10:11pm: The NBA said on today’s call that it plans to continue doing its homework over the next two-to-four weeks before making any decisions on whether to resume the season, Wojnarowski writes in his full report on today’s Board of Governors call. Sources tell ESPN that the league still isn’t sure exactly what a resumed season would look like or whether all 30 teams would participate.
The league office isn’t necessarily optimistic about rapid-response coronavirus testing becoming widely available over the next month, but will continue monitoring developments in testing types, as well as studying the trajectory of cases in reopening states and examining how other leagues that are restarting are handling positive tests, Woj adds.
Wojnarowski also reports that the NBA is hopeful that 22 of the league’s 30 teams will have their practice facilities reopened by next Monday.
9:36pm: There’s more optimism about the NBA resuming its season after commissioner Adam Silver concluded his call with the Board of Governors today, Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN.com reports (Twitter link). According to Wojnarowski, the conversation included significant detail on how other pro sports leagues are handling their respective returns.
Positive COVID-19 tests may not result in a re-suspension of the season. Woj adds that the discussion between Silver and the Board of Governors touched on how the league and players need to be comfortable with some positive tests. It remains to be seen how many positive tests would qualify as too many.
The league continues to look for ways to resume the campaign as safely as possible. Silver used the term “campus environment” when referring to what’s being called a bubble, Wojnarowski adds.
The NBPA has sent a memo to agents signaling the belief that players want to finish out the campaign. Many of the league’s stars are unified on that front as they look to find a way to resume play.
NBA Players Committee Begins Parsing Comeback Plans
The National Basketball Players Association has sent a memo to agents stating that there’s a sense that both the players and the league want to finish the 2019/20 season, Shams Charania of The Athletic tweets.
NBPA president Chris Paul is joined by Russell Westbrook, Jayson Tatum, Kyle Lowry, and Dwight Powell on a committee that is working with the league on potential plans.
Paul reportedly held a call with many of the NBA’s superstars on Monday — including LeBron James, Stephen Curry, and Kawhi Leonard — discussing the coronavirus ramifications and the potential to resume the season. Those star players were unified in their desire to play out the 2019/20 campaign.
The NBPA polled players via text, asking them how they felt about completing the season. One player told Broderick Turner of the Los Angeles Times that he believes that the percentage is “70-30” of players who want to finish out the campaign.
“But 30% is a big number,” the player said. “And what do you say to somebody who says, ‘You know what, I just don’t feel safe?’ It’s hard to argue that. But there are reasons to argue that because I know the NBA would be one of the safest places to be at. That thing would be tight, clean, protocol, all that.”
Las Vegas and Orlando continue to be tossed around as options to hold clusters of games in order to reduce the risk of COVID-19 spreading through travel. However, the league hasn’t made any firm decisions yet.
“We have been approached by multiple properties regarding potential options for hosting NBA games, including MGM,” NBA spokesman Mike Bass said. “We have not engaged in any substantive discussions.”
LeBron, Giannis, Curry, Other Stars United In Desire To Resume Season
NBPA president Chris Paul arranged a private conference call with a number of the league’s superstars on Monday to discuss the coronavirus ramifications and the potential resumption of the 2019/20 season, league sources tell Chris Haynes of Yahoo Sports.
By the end of the conversation, per Haynes, those players were united in their desire to resume the season once the NBA ensures the necessary safety measures are in place and gets the green light. According to Haynes, LeBron James, Giannis Antetokounmpo, Stephen Curry, Anthony Davis, Kevin Durant, Kawhi Leonard, Damian Lillard, and Russell Westbrook were among the players on the call.
As Haynes explains, the group’s decision is expected to carry significant weight at a time when not all of the NBA’s players are necessarily on board with the idea of completing the 2019/20 season this summer.
Sources tell Yahoo Sports that many players on teams who are all but eliminated from playoff contention would prefer to just have the top eight clubs in each conference finish the season. The fact that stars outside the playoff picture, such as Curry and Lillard, are in favor of resuming play is significant.
According to Haynes, there was also some concern among players after Friday’s call that the NBA wouldn’t be able to guarantee player safety, with a coronavirus vaccine not expected to be available until 2021 at the earliest. Commissioner Adam Silver assured players that the league will do all it can to create the safest possible conditions, and it sounds like the stars on Monday’s call are satisfied with that promise.
Haynes notes that there are some players out of the playoff picture who are worried about a canceled season negatively impacting the league’s Collective Bargaining Agreement. That’s an issue we’ve touched upon in recent days, with Adrian Wojnarowski, Bob Myers, and Mark Cuban among those who have suggested that lottery teams will have to prioritize the “greater good” of the league, since the NBA and its players would benefit financially over the long term from playing as many games as it safely can this year and next.
As we relayed earlier this afternoon, the NBPA has reportedly begun reaching out to individual players to get their feedback on whether or not they want the season to resume.
NBA Cancels 2020 G League Elite Camp
The NBA has canceled its 2020 G League Elite Camp, sources tell Shams Charania of The Athletic (Twitter link). The event had been scheduled to take place from May 17-19, prior to the draft combine, so there was no expectation it would move forward as planned next week. However, it’s notable that it has been canceled rather than delayed, according to Charania’s report.
In a typical year, the Elite Camp would consist of 40 NBA G League invitees participating in the first half of the event before 40 top draft-eligible players (who weren’t invited to the combine) participate in the second half. The invites would have been sent out to players at the start of May.
[RELATED: Tentative 2020 NBA Draft Dates, Deadlines]
Last year, several draft-eligible prospects who took part in the G League Elite Camp were eventually drafted or received two-way contracts, including Cody Martin, Terance Mann, Justin Wright-Foreman, Tacko Fall, Dewan Hernandez, Oshae Brissett, and Tyler Cook, among others. The event gave non-combine players a chance to audition for NBA evaluators, so the fact that it won’t happen this year may result in some borderline prospects pulling their names from the draft pool.
A number of the G League players who participated in the 2019 Elite Camp also received NBA opportunities during the ’19/20 season, including Juan Toscano-Anderson, Mychal Mulder, and Norvel Pelle.
China’s CCTV Has No Plans To Resume Airing NBA Games
CCTV, the major state-owned media network in China, has no plans to resume airing NBA games once the league is able to resume play, as ESPN’s Brian Windhorst writes. The network stopped broadcasting NBA content last fall following Daryl Morey‘s tweet in support of Hong Kong protestors.
As Windhorst outlines, the NBA named Michael Ma its new CEO of NBA China this week, and there were signs that the league hoped the appointment would help thaw its relationships with Chinese partners. His father Ma Guoli is regarded as “the father of CCTV Sports,” having run it for the last 16 years, according to Windhorst.
However, the Chinese network is apparently still unwilling to extend an olive branch to the NBA, issuing a statement to the Global Times “reiterating its consistent stance on national sovereignty,” per Windhorst. CCTV’s stance has been that it won’t resume showing NBA games as long as Morey remains unpunished for his tweet.
While the COVID-19 pandemic will ultimately be more damaging to the NBA’s finances this season, the ongoing tension with China is also costing the league a significant amount of money. As Windhorst writes, commissioner Adam Silver estimated in February that the NBA had lost more than $300MM as a result of the controversy. If those revenue streams are lost permanently going forward, they’d have at least a modest impact on the growth of the league’s salary cap.
Unlike CCTV, Chinese streaming giant Tencent resumed broadcasting NBA games last October, just a few weeks after the Morey incident. However, as detailed by J. Brady McCollough and Tommy Yang in The Los Angeles Times in February, the relationship between the NBA and Tencent remains tenuous as well, with the service having lost advertisers and having reduced the amount of games it shows.
An industry official told The Times that the deal between the NBA and Tencent, a five-year agreement worth a reported $1.5 billion, could be in jeopardy. It’s currently set to run through 2024/25.
Blake Griffin Says He’s Healthy, “Ready To Go”
Blake Griffin was limited to just 18 games this season for the Pistons and hasn’t seen the court since December 28, having undergone knee surgery in early January. However, appearing today on The Encore with Sage Steele (Twitter video link), Griffin shared some positive news on his recovery.
“I feel great,” Griffin said (8:30 mark in video; hat tip to Josh Weinstein of TheScore). “I’ve basically been cleared for a while now, I just have been stuck in my house. I’m ready to go whenever things pick back up. I’m just working out and trying to stay ready and stay sane. It’s nice to be healthy though.”
The Pistons didn’t provide a specific timetable for Griffin’s recovery when he underwent surgery at the start of the year, simply ruling him out “indefinitely.” A couple weeks later, Detroit received a disabled player exception as a result of Griffin’s injury, a signal that he was expected to be sidelined through at least June 15.
Of course, if the 2019/20 NBA season resumes, it will almost certainly happen after June 15, and Griffin’s comments suggest he could suit up at that point. However, there’s no guarantee that will happen.
Although we don’t know yet what a resumed season will look like, it seems unlikely that the lottery-bound Pistons would play more than a handful of regular season games, if they’re required to play at all. As such, Detroit may proceed with caution and decide it’s not worth the risk to have Griffin return for those games, even if he feels as if he’s fully healthy.
Still, the update from the six-time All-Star is a good sign that – at the very least – he should be fully ready to go whenever the 2020/21 season gets underway.
Pacers Rumors: Oladipo, Turner, Sabonis, Draft
A report earlier this month indicated that teams around the NBA are expected to monitor Victor Oladipo, who will be entering a contract year in 2020/21 and hadn’t fully hit his stride with the new-look Pacers since returning from a major leg injury.
However, a league source tells J. Michael of The Indianapolis Star that Oladipo isn’t going anywhere anytime soon. According to that source, the Pacers have no plans to shop the two-time All-Star on the trade market during the 2020 offseason, and intend to focus on locking him up to a new deal beyond 2021. Oladipo’s name hasn’t come up in any trade talks to date, two sources told Michael.
As previous reports have indicated, Oladipo and the Pacers briefly discussed an extension before the 2019/20 season began, but he only could have added three new years at that point and wouldn’t have been eligible to increase his salary to the league max.
Oladipo decided at that point to wait on negotiating a new contract and will likely take the same approach during the 2020 offseason, according to Michael, who notes that Oladipo could maximize his potential earnings by waiting until his contract expires in 2021 to sign a new one. At that point, he’d be eligible for up to five years if he re-signs with Indiana.
Here’s more on the Pacers:
- Despite a long-standing belief among outside observers that Domantas Sabonis and Myles Turner aren’t compatible, there was no indication at the trade deadline that the Pacers planned to move either player, according to Michael. Still, the club remains in the market for a power forward, Michael adds.
- Turner drew some interest around the NBA prior to the deadline, particularly from the Wizards, according to Michael. One source tells the Indy Star that Washington was only inquiring about the big man for future reference, but another source told the Star that a “key player” from the Wizards sat down with someone close to Turner to directly express interest. According to Michael, Turner’s camp didn’t take those inquiries too seriously because they were aware Indiana wasn’t looking to move the 24-year-old.
- The Pacers weren’t interested in adding 2020 draft picks in pre-deadline deals, since they’re “not enamored by” the 2020 draft class and are in win-now mode, says Michael.
- Michael adds that “for the foreseeable future, no one is going anywhere,” since the Pacers like their roster.
NBA, NBPA Extend CBA Termination Deadline
The NBA and the NBPA have reached an agreement to extend the window during which the league can terminate the Collective Bargaining Agreement, reports ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski. The previous 60-day period, which began when the season was suspended on March 11, had been set to expire. The deadline will be pushed back to September, according to Wojnarowski.
It may sound ominous that the NBA will continue to have the ability to “terminate” the CBA, but it’s more of a necessary formality at this point. The “force majeure” provision gives the league that power, but the NBA has no interest in taking advantage of it for now, since both the league and the players’ union want to resume the 2019/20 season in the coming months.
In order for that to happen, the Collective Bargaining Agreement will need to be restructured, so delaying this deadline gives the two sides more time to gather information on the league’s projected financial losses and to work through issues like next season’s salary cap and luxury tax thresholds, as Woj explains. When the time comes, the NBA and the NBPA figure to work together to negotiate the necessary adjustments to the CBA.
“This CBA was not built for an extended pandemic,” Silver said on Friday’s conference call with players, per ESPN. “There’s not a mechanism in it that works to properly accept a cap when you’ve got so much uncertainty; when we’d be going in next season saying, “Well, our revenue could be $10 billion or it could be $6 billion. Or maybe it could be less.”
Besides figuring out salary cap details going forward, the league and the players’ union will have to negotiate a number of other issues, including how the players will be paid for whatever portion of the 2019/20 season can be played, how free agency will work, and what the NBA schedule will look like in 2020/21 and beyond.
Kai Sotto Opts For G League Professional Path
Kai Sotto, a 7’2″ center from the Philippines, intends to pass on college ball and will instead join the G League’s revamped professional program, sources tell Shams Charania of The Athletic (Twitter link).
The G League’s new Select Team has landed a number of notable high school recruits, including guards Jalen Green and Daishen Nix, as well as forward Isaiah Todd. Sotto represents the first international prospect who will sign a contract with the NBAGL program, as Charania notes.
A four-star recruit who comes in at No. 62 overall on ESPN’s 2020 rankings, Sotto arrived stateside in 2019 and joined The Skill Factory, a prep program based in Georgia. A handful of colleges were believed to be keeping an eye on the big man, including Kentucky, Georgia Tech, Auburn, and USC, but he’ll opt to go pro as he pursues an eventual NBA career.
ESPN’s Jonathan Givony and Mike Schmitz wrote in February about their impressions of Sotto at the Basketball Without Borders camp, with Givony noting that the youngster’s talent stood out in drills, even as he “struggled to make his presence felt in the games.” According to ESPN’s scouting report, Sotto has a versatile skill set given his size, handling the ball well and displaying three-point range on his jump shot.
Meanwhile, Dakota Schmidt of Ridiculous Upside wrote on Sunday that he viewed Sotto and the G League Select Team as a good fit for one another, pointing out that taking on a project like Sotto would allow the program to prove it’s capable of developing prospects who are still fairly raw.
NBA Will Likely Need To Restructure CBA Amid Pandemic
During Adam Silver‘s call with NBA players on Friday, many near-term questions were presented, but there was a shortage of definitive answers as the league aims to resume its 2019/20 season. Silver stressed the need for testing and how it will expand as players return to practice facilities. Additionally, more information was provided in terms of travel, training camp and the 2020/21 season.
All of that doesn’t even scratch the surface of the financial impact the league will endure. With the season suspended in March, there have been no NBA games for two months and if they do resume, there is no guarantee fans will be allowed, potentially for all of 2020.
Per ESPN’s Bobby Marks (Twitter link), the NBA was projecting $8 billion in revenue for the current season and $8.4 billion in 2020/21. However, those projections were in place before the coronavirus outbreak. As Silver noted, having fans in the stands for all games equates to 40% of the NBA’s revenue.
If the league moves forward with fan-less arenas, which may be limited to one or two locations at least for the rest of 2019/20, the loss of revenue will essentially force the league to restructure the current collective bargaining agreement. The league has already cut back salaries of employees, including players, while teams evaluate paying non-laid off or furloughed employees on a month to month basis.