N BA, players union stiffen virus protocols
With four games called off thisweek already and more teams dealing with virus-related issues, theNBAand the National Basketball Players Association enacted additional rules Tuesday in the hope of keeping the season going safely.
Among the new policies: for “at least the next two weeks,” the leagueandunion said, players and team staff will have to remain at their residencewhenintheirhome markets and prohibited from leaving their hotels or having outside guests when on the road.
Many of the newrules are similar towhat existed in the NBA’s restart bubble atWalt DisneyWorldinCentral Florida last year.
Orlando’s game in Boston onWednesdaywasalsocalled off, the fourth postponement since Sunday and the third
involving the Celtics. Boston currently has eight players listed as unavailable because they are on the NBA’s health and safety protocols list — which means they either tested positive or may have been exposed to someone who is positive.
“We’re just going to follow what theNBA” says, Washington
coach Scott Brooks said. “I mean, they’re the experts. They have all the medical, they have all the science, they have everything, all the data. ... I’m forwhatever the NBA wants us to do.”
All that is permitted in home markets, for now, is “to attendteam-relatedactivities at the team facility or arena, exercise outside, or performessential activities,“the league and union said. On the road, team activities andemergencies are the only allowable reasons for leaving.
TheWizards said Tuesday that two of their players are going on the protocols list. TheMagic are also supposed to play the Celtics on Friday in Boston; no determination about that game has been announced.
“I feel like I’m living my life in a box,“Portland guard Damian Lillard saidMonday night. “I go to practice, I go back home, I don’t go anywhere else.“
When teams started testing in lateNovember prior to thestartoftraining camps, 48 playershadpositiveCOVID-19 tests. In the last four weeks, the league has seen a total of seven players test positive, part of the reason why the NBA and its governors have not seen any reason to pause the season.
Additional actions taken Tuesday include a new rule prohibiting any pregame meetings in locker rooms from lasting more than 10 minutes, and when those meetings takeplaceeveryone involvedmustwear amask. Meetings in larger areas, such as courts, must take place with adherence to social distancing and with masks.
Players now have to limit interactions with other players to elbow or fist bumps, withnoextendedsocializing. Andwhen a player is subbed out of a game, he can sit in a new “cool down chairs” without a mask — but put a mask onwhen he returns to the bench area and sits in his regularly assigned seat.
Based on the most recent information released by teams, though the numbers canchangequickly, atleast36 players in the NBA entering Tuesday were dealing with some sort of virus-related issue. Those issues include players having to sit because contact-tracing data showed theymay have been exposed tosomeonewhomaybe positive for COVID-19.
“We’re in a tough spot with COVID,“Philadelphia coachDocRiverssaidafterhis depleted teamlost inAtlanta onMonday night. “Not a lot we can do with it. I have a sneaking feeling that there’s going tobe a lot of teamswith this problem.“
Miami was preparing to play inPhiladelphia on Tuesday without eight players becauseofvirus-relatedissues and subsequent contact tracing, a problem for the Heat that presented itself after they played in Washington on Saturday night. Boston’s game in Chicago on Tuesday was called off because of virus concerns, aswas the Dallas-NewOrleans game on Monday and the Heat-Celtics matchup in Boston on Sunday.