Still no vax, Kyrie’s back: Nets look to star guard for help
NEW YORK (AP) — Kyrie Irving might be just the jolt the Brooklyn Nets need to escape a midseason slump.
It looks like they’ll find out Wednesday night at Indiana.
After being held out of the team’s first 35 games because he refused to get vaccinated against the coronavirus, Irving is set to make his highly anticipated season debut.
Coach Steve Nash was still finalizing plans for how the guard will be used.
“He could definitely start,” Nash said after the Nets’ morning shootaround. “I think he could play a full chunk of minutes. He’s had three or four full-court days so I think he can play extended minutes.”
Irving has been unable to play at home and for much of the season because of New York City’s vaccination mandate and was unwelcome on the road. The Nets didn’t want a part-time player, so sent him away during the preseason.
Things changed. Nash said with the recent COVID-19 outbreak that left the Nets severely short-handed, having the superstar part-time was a better option than signing more players to 10-day hardship contracts.
“So why not bring him back?” Nash said.
The Nets have lost three straight, all at home, and there’s nothing Irving can do about the Nets’ struggles in Brooklyn if he remains unvaccinated. The vaccine is mandated for New York City athletes playing in public venues. He has said refusing it was what’s best for him and that he was aware there would be consequences.
But he can play in road games in the cities where there is no mandate, including all the upcoming ones during a stretch that has the Nets away for seven of their next 11 games.
Irving’s situation is rare in professional sports.
The NBA has said 97% of its players are fully vaccinated — which would basically mean no more than 15 players in the league are unvaccinated, Irving presumably among them. That is consistent with other sports leagues; the NFL said in mid-December that about 95% of its players are vaccinated, and the NHL touts a 99% rate with no more than four players unvaccinated.
As of last month, the NBA said two-thirds of players were also boosted, a figure that has likely risen in recent weeks given constant urging from the league and the National Basketball Players Association. They have pointed to the recent surge in virus-related issues as proof that boosters are absolutely critical to keeping the league going.
“Boosters are highly effective,” NBA Commissioner Adam Silver told ESPN last month.
Unvaccinated players in the NBA are subject to almost-daily testing (the exception being off days without a game, practice or travel) and more stringent requirements, such as not being able to dine with teammates and additional social-distancing rules — even covering where their lockers can be in relation to their teammates.
“I knew the consequences,” Irving said last week of his vaccination decision. “I wasn’t prepared for them, by no stretch of imagination coming into the season.”