Contact tracing plays critical role
Schedule hinges on tracking of movements, interactions
COVID-19 didn’t keep Heat center Bam Adebayo out of any games last season, even though he tested positive for the virus not long before the NBA’s restart bubble opened.
He has missed two games this season because of the virus — without having it.
Adebayo is one of many players sidelined this season by contact tracing, the method of figuring out who may have possibly been exposed to a person who has tested positive for COVID-19. It has been a major factor in the decisions to postpone 20 games so far this season, including the latest three Grizzlies’ games that the league decided Thursday to push back.
“As much as we may complain about it, it’s for our own benefit,” the Wizards’ Bradley Beal said.
Beal is one of the players who has missed games this season because of contact tracing, a process in which the NBA and its teams take a deep dive into who people have been around over a two-day period once someone tests positive.
Everything is examined — who might have shared a car ride with whom, who sat where on the team plane, who had dinner with others and what their whereabouts have been. Even the cameras that have been used for advanced stat tracking during games are utilized, just to see how long one player may have been in close proximity of someone else during a game.
“We’re doing as well as we can be, during what’s a very difficult time, not just for the NBA but for a lot of peopleinthecountry,”saidNBAseniorVPDavidWeiss, who helps oversee all the health and safety efforts for the league. “And I think we’re doing that well because everybody — from players, staff, families — is making some shared sacrifices to try to do as well as we can.”
The NBA has even hired staffers with public health backgrounds, who knew what contact tracing was before it became a buzz term in the sports world a few months ago, to assist in the process.
Players get asked a series of questions; examples include if they played 1-on-1 against anyone in practice, if they’ve recently gotten a massage or therapy, was the person administering that treatment wearing a mask, or if they’ve recently socialized with others for more than a few moments.
The answers help create the path for investigators to follow.
The biggest culprits that have led to players being flagged and ruled out during the contact tracing process: meals and shared rides, improper mask usage. The smaller the area where people are congregating, the smaller the air volume, the higher the risk — and the NBA has been telling teams that since the protocols for the bubble were established back in June.
“Contact tracing involves a lot of different sources and information,” Weiss said. “The core of it is interviews, to the stats that we collect digitally, to pictures of spaces, to all to all kinds of different things. And the information technology is helpful.”
The Grizzlies won’t have enough available players until at least the middle of next week, the NBA said — in part because of contact tracing. Friday’s road game against the Trail Blazers, along with home games Sunday and Monday against the Kings, were pushed back, the NBA said. That decision came one day after the Grizzlies’ game against the Blazers in Portland, scheduled for Wednesday, was also called off.
The Grizzlies are assured of what will be no less than a nine-day break. They played Monday against the Suns — getting their fifth straight win to improve to 7-6 and get over the .500 mark for the first time this season. The earliest they’ll play again is Jan. 27 against the Bulls.
All but one of the 20 postponements have come since Jan. 10. The Wizards — who will go at least 13 days between games after a half-dozen of its players tested positive — have seen six games called off, and the Grizzlies have now had five pushed back.
In all, 23 teams have seen at least one game called off so far this season. The only exceptions: the Nets, Knicks, Raptors, Nuggets, Spurs, Clippers and Lakers.
Postponed games, when possible, will be made up in the second half of the season.