Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Spoelstra on Marlins’ COVID-19 situation: ‘It’s humbling’
Miami Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said Monday night that even amid his team’s protection of the NBA’s bubble type of setting at Disney World, the Miami Marlins’ COVID-19 outbreak still hit home.
In the wake of the Marlins’ home opener being postponed, Spoelstra said after his team’s practice at Disney World that he appreciates the tenuousness of all sports attempting to play through the new coronavirus pandemic.
“It’s humbling,” Spoelstra said. “We have to absolutely continue to remain respectful and humble with this virus. I’ve said it many times, we are not in control.”
The NBA, unlike MLB and the NFL, is attempting to mitigate such circumstances by adopting its bubble type of quarantine setting amid the pandemic.
“We feel very confident about the plan and the depth of planning and thought that has gone into this operation here in this campus, this bubble,” Spoelstra said. “There’s a lot of planning. I remember being on so many calls for weeks and it’s based on a great deal of science and an incredible [amount] of collaboration from the league, Players’ Association, the organizations and the leadership from the NBA office and, in particular, [commissioner] Adam Silver.”
Spoelstra said it is a time when there are no givens, including even in the NBA’s quarantine mode on the Disney campus.
“You feel like as soon as you feel like you can relax or get comfortable, that something is going to happen,” he said. “I still wake up every morning and the first thing I do is I check my phone to wait for my text message from [trainer] Jay Sabol, just to get the news of the results of the testing. I think that’s just the way it’s going to continue to be.”
A negative result comes by email. A positive result comes by phone call — and leads to immediate quarantine.
The Heat completed their three-game scrimmage schedule Tuesday with a 128-110 loss to the Memphis Grizzlies.
Their regular season resumes Saturday at 1 p.m. against the Denver Nuggets, with all games in the absence of fans at the Wide World of Sports complex.
Also Monday from Disney: Spoelstra started center Bam Adebayo against the Grizzlies. Adebayo scored 16 points and played 25 minutes. He missed the first two scrimmages due to his late arrival to the NBA campus.
Adebayo declined to discuss basketball during his Monday interview, instead focusing on Breonna Taylor and the lack of arrests in that case.
Before taking questions, Adebayo opened with, “Hold up. Hold on. Before we start this, I just want to say, this interview won’t go any further because all my answers will be about Daniel Cameron making a response to us about the injustice for Breonna Taylor and arresting those cops and holding them accountable.”
He later ended his interview again with, “Black Lives Matter, people.”
Spoelstra revealed that rookie forward KZ Okpala is dealing with tendinitis that kept him out of Saturday’s scrimmage loss to the Jazz, but might be able to play Tuesday. “So we’ve been measured with his last couple practices,” Spoelstra said.
Tuesday’s game pit Jae Crowder against the team that dealt him to the Heat at the February NBA trading deadline. “I know it’s a business,” he said Monday. “I don’t get too tied up in it.” Crowder said he was appreciative of Grizzlies management sending him to a contender.