Hard to find a star so bright
So much for good health and good cheer.
Both are in short supply in the NBA this Christmas, especially for the 10 teams that will be playing on the holiday.
Superstars are sitting. Supposed super teams are struggling. The games will go on, which is the most important thing during a time when the NBA has been forced to postpone nine of them because of a coronavirus surge.
But there is a chance they will go on without Kevin Durant, Giannis Antetokounmpo, Luka Doncic and Trae Young, who all were in the NBA’s health and safety protocols in the days leading into the five-game slate.
“You don’t want anybody out, whether it’s injury, COVID illness, whatnot,” Bucks’ Khris Middleton said. “I wish all those guys could be out there playing. But right now we’ve just got to deal with the cards that we’re dealt.”
It’s not going to be the one NBA fans — or sports fans in general — envisioned when looking forward to these holidays.
Sports has not been able to escape the surge in coronavirus cases driven by the new omicron variant. Bowl games are being canceled, teams are being forced to pull out of college postseason matchups, NFL players have been sidelined, and the NHL started its Christmas break early and its players are not playing in the upcoming Olympics.
In the NBA, more than 100 players have gone into protocols, leaving teams in some cases forced to sign players just to have the minimum eight required to play. As injury reports lengthened throughout December, with the Nets and Bulls both having 10 players in protocols at times, there were questions about whether the NBA would be better off just pausing the season.
“The league’s in a tough position,” Nets coach Steve Nash said. “Do you shut it down and extend it? Or what do you do, because you could shut it down and still the West Coast theoretically could get hit by the virus later and then what, we shut it down again?”
His Nets visit the Lakers in the prime-time spot on the schedule. The other games: Hawks at Knicks, Celtics at Bucks, Warriors at Suns and Mavericks at Jazz.
All the top players will be missed, but Mavs coach Jason Kidd tried to put a positive spin on the depressing news. It’s been 14 years since the NBA returned to playing five games on the holiday. For much of his playing career that began in 1994, there were only two games, so many players never even got a Christmas game.
Now, some guys who might only be in the league because of COVID19 absences might end up playing in one.
“That will be a special time for them, too,” Kidd said. “We can’t take that for granted, because a lot of times growing up, you could only see two games or one game. That was the Michael Jordans of the world. But now you get five or six games and with COVID going on, there’s a lot of guys playing that would normally not get the chance to play on Christmas.”