NBA brass frets over recent star benchings

With the Golden State Warriors and Cleveland Cavaliers — who faced off in the past two NBA Finals and are the favourites to meet there a third time this June — opting to sit all of their star players each of the past two Saturday nights on national television, the issue of resting players has become a hot topic. The NBA’s league office has noticed.

In a memo sent to all 30 NBA teams, NBA commissioner Adam Silver said that resting players has “become an extremely significant issue for our league” and said there will be a “full discussion” of the practice at the April 6 board of governors meeting.

ESPN first reported the memo, which was later obtained by The Washington Post.

What’s clear is that with the spotlight on the league for the decisions of Warriors coach Steve Kerr and Cavaliers coach Tyronn Lue to sit their stars on back-to-back weekends, the NBA isn’t happy.

Silver has implored the league’s owners to get involved in the decision-making process.

“Decisions of this kind do not merely implicate issues of player health and team performance on the court,” Silver said in the memo. “They also can affect fans and business partners, impact our reputation and damage the perception of our game. With so much at stake, it is simply not acceptable for governors to be uninvolved or to defer decision-making authority on these matters to others in their organizations.”

But the league could find itself going down a slippery slope if it tries to dictate who can sit and who can’t. The Warriors sat Steph Curry, Draymond Green, Klay Thompson and Andre Iguodala in San Antonio on the second night of a back-to-back set after playing eight games in eight cities in 13 days.