The NBA’s Board of Governors, as well as commissioner Adam Silver, have been in fairly regular communication about the return of the 2019-20 regular season. A number of details have been discussed, with tons of scenarios being thrown out regularly on how the league will proceed.
Nothing is concrete yet, but that could soon change given the momentum of the league’s planning. Perhaps the only information that is known by all is that – should the season continue – it will be at either one or two single locations. Those would most likely be Disney World in Orlando, or Las Vegas.
There are many other things that must be figured out between now and mid-July, when play is hopeful to resume.
Part of this process includes a conference call between Silver and the Board of Governors this week, where a timetable and details about returning to play will reportedly be discussed, according to Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN:
The NBA has a board of governors call set for next Friday, which is expected to provide additional details for teams on a timetable and plan to proceed with the season. Teams are expecting the league to instruct them to start recalling players to their team’s markets around June 1, sources told ESPN.
While this is absolutely good news regarding the return of the 2019-20 NBA season, this is still all a logistics nightmare. Silver has said that he does not want to lock players in hotel rooms, opting for a more college campus like environment. However, this could lead to players and staff getting more easily infected.
Because of this, the league needs to figure out a strict and consistent testing system while not taking away tests from the general public.
On top of all of that, they need to actually schedule out a postseason, and which teams will head to the single-site. They could just start directly in the playoffs with the standings from when the hiatus began, but that could be unfair to teams that had a legitimate shot at making the playoffs.
Then, after all of that is said and done, the NBA needs to reschedule the entire offseason, as well as the beginning of next season. It seems like almost a guarantee that the 2020-21 season will begin somewhere around Christmas, but nothing is definitive.
Suffice to say, the Board of Governors call on Friday will be extremely important for not only the immediate outlook of the sport but the future as well.