Good article on ideas the NBA is looking at- which do you favour and does it impact what you think the Knicks should do this offseason?
LAKE BUENA VISTA, Fla. -- Inside and outside of ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex, there's far less tension over the sturdiness of the NBA bubble experiment than the uncertainty of the NBA's next season. The league's owners are desperate for customers returning to the stands and suites, for the NBA's game-night machinery to regenerate lost revenue.Privately, this is a league constantly asking commissioner Adam Silver and his understudies: What's next?
As the league starts to frame the possibilities, they're telling teams simply: The priority for 2020-21 is playing 82 games and playing as often as possible with fans in the seats. For now, those conversations are ongoing, numerous and forever evolving.
Mostly, the NBA is trying to live in the real world, where science and data govern reality -- and that has left everyone scrambling for solutions in a country with no national plan for a virus killing a thousand Americans a day.
Is the NBA flexible on Dec. 1?
The NBA has told teams that the plan remains to start on Dec. 1, but pushing back that date would require a level of confidence that a delay would ultimately result in the reopening of arenas to the public.
If so, the NBA would be willing to hold back the start -- perhaps even months. An opening night of Martin Luther King Jr. Day -- Jan. 18 -- is a consideration. February and March are realistic, too, if a combination of vaccines, therapeutics and rapid-response testing for COVID-19 could contribute to the possibility of public gatherings.
There's hope for vaccines, but the league has prepared teams for the reality that mass distribution would be unlikely for a full year, sources said. For now, too, there's a skepticism about the reliability of rapid-response testing. They're hopeful that advances in the technology could facilitate ways to get fans into arenas -- even if it means less than capacity. Teams are already modeling options that include a few thousand fans to buildings filled closer to capacity.
So what if no arenas -- or a scant few -- are able to host fans in December?
In most NBA venues, it's almost a certainty that mass sport gatherings are unlikely early this winter.
The NBA will consider playing games in practice facilities that are more cost-effective and more easily repurposed for television, sources said. Another idea: What if some markets could house fans, but others can't? That has opened a conversation about neutral-site games. NBA teams could move operations to other league cities -- or more likely, non-NBA markets -- that could allow for paying customers.
For example, New York, Los Angeles and Washington could lag in the ability to reopen. Toronto can't be sure that Canada's borders will reopen to traveling parties from the United States. That would necessitate the Toronto Raptors finding a home in the United States.
So those are far less likely scenarios than the NBA starting next season where it plans to end this summer, right?
Yes, the bubble.
This time, ideas center on regional sites and windows of participation that would extend a month for teams, sources said. After that, teams would go home and train -- perhaps for two weeks -- and move onto the next regional bubble against a new pod of teams. Orlando is a consideration, and Las Vegas -- a finalist for this summer's restart -- would reemerge as a possible site too, sources said.
This is one of the ideas, a way to buy time until fans could return to arenas. NBPA executive director Michele Roberts is on the record with ESPN's Tim Bontemps as endorsing the idea -- if the country remains flummoxed by the virus: "If tomorrow looks like today, and today we all acknowledge -- and this is not Michele talking, this is the league, together with the PA and our respective experts saying, 'This is the way to do it' -- then that's going to have to be the way to do it," she told ESPN.
Why a Dec. 1 start date for the 2020-21 season?
Christmas Day games are crucial to the NBA on a lot of levels, but the NBA needs a window to play 82 games, complete the playoffs and still allow its players the chance to participate in the 2021 Tokyo Games in July.
These are noble intentions, but there's increasing skepticism within the league about how long accommodating the Olympics can remain a priority.
For now, here's one idea on the league's whiteboard, sources said: If the NBA believes it can significantly push back the start of the season to buy time on getting fans back into arenas, they've brainstormed the idea of a month-long Olympic break reminiscent of how the NHL has handled the Winter Olympics.
As the pandemic rages on, there's less optimism about the elite players participating in the Olympics -- including Americans and international stars. The NBA and NBPA will take positions that the Games are important, but the Olympics are barely a priority for the owners -- especially when they don't share in the television revenue that originates from the inclusion of the league's superstars. Organizations see the wear and tear on players in whom they've invested hundreds of millions of dollars. Amid a pandemic, the Olympics mean even less to owners, team executives and the NBPA.
At a minimum, Team USA probably will have to be prepared to bring a much younger, less accomplished roster to Tokyo -- a team profile that could ultimately mirror the rest of the world's entries, too.
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Is the Orlando bubble a possible destination for the eight teams left out of the restart to run offseason training camps once the first batch of 22 teams are eliminated?
The NBPA has no interest in that idea, sources said. It's a non-starter. The inevitable solution for the eight teams left out of Orlando: The NBA and NBPA agreeing upon voluntary workouts in the team facilities, sources said.
The NBPA won't agree to mandatory reporting for players on the eight teams outside of the restart but will eventually allow it on a voluntary level, sources said. Several of the teams are frustrated and angry over how far they feel they're falling behind the teams in the bubble, and are aggressively voicing that to the league office.
"We are looking at nine months between games now, and if the season is delayed, we are looking at possibly a full year between competitive games," one GM told ESPN on Friday. "That's unprecedented in the history of the sport. We deserve help here."
8/9/2020 12:44 PM