Over the past few years it has been unclear whether the NBA fully understood the damage being done to the league and players by the load management that was becoming more fashionable.
Teams and players “follow the science.” Anyone who complains that it’s too loud for the fans is dismissed as a curvy dinosaur who doesn’t understand the advances in research and data that have occurred in the last decade-plus.
It appears as if, finally, a reckoning has come.
When commissioner Adam Silver stood behind the podium last week to discuss the league’s new battle against load management, it was an acknowledgment of the precarious position the league finds itself in. to fans and television partners about a product that often, often in recent times, leaves the two most important stakeholders outside feeling insulted during the regular season when a star or many stars sat.
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The NBA board of governors approved the new star rest policy
“There’s a feeling from all the different constituent groups in the league that it’s ultimately about the fans and we’ve taken it too far,” Silver said. “It’s a recognition that it’s been a little bit lost from us, and that, I think especially when you see young, healthy players who are resting and maybe more of an idea of the size on around the league as opposed to absolutely necessary rest, or it’s part of being an NBA player that you take a few days off.
“That’s what we’re trying to get away from.”
This is a populist stance taken by Silver. Fans have labored over the practice of resting healthy players for years, gritting their teeth when they buy tickets for a game only to find out before the announcement that a high-profile player sits down to rest. Although the conversations aren’t always public, one would think that executives at ESPN and TNT also aren’t happy when players are sitting out games they’re paying billions to broadcast.
Silver previously said load management was an issue for the league, but in February, at the All-Star game in Salt Lake City, he defended the practice and said there was “medical data” to support teams giving the their most important. players a day off here and there.
“This year we’re probably going to break the all-time ticket sales record,” Silver said at All-Star Weekend. “We probably have an all-time record for season-ticket changes. So our fans don’t have to suggest they’re upset with the product we’re presenting.
Seven months later, he was singing a different tune.
“Everybody recognizes it’s an issue,” Silver said after the league’s board of governors approved a new star rest policy aimed at preventing healthy stars from resting for games in national television, “and this is an issue for the fans.”
Everyone recognizes that this is an issue right now because the landscape seems to be changing rapidly around the league. For more than a year, team executives have been devising long-term salary cap strategies that operate under the assumption that the cap will remain tight, especially after the NBA agreed to a new television contract. The NBA’s current $24 billion deal with ESPN and Warner Bros. Discovery (TNT’s parent company), is set to end at the end of the 2024-25 season.
When the current contract was agreed upon in 2014, its scope shocked many. Talks in league circles over the past two seasons have included speculation that the new deal could triple in size as live sports become more and more important to networks trying to stay afloat. audience attention in the modern business of content consumption.
That’s not so sure after a recent standoff between Charter Communications and Disney that led to more than 15 million cable subscribers losing access to ABC, Disney, ESPN and many other channels earlier this month. The issue has been resolved, but this is the first real sign that the seemingly limitless leverage ESPN has over its distributors is being challenged for the first time. Add to that the collapse of regional sports networks and the shift in viewing habits to streaming and there is a change under the league’s feet in how they get their games in front of large audiences. eyeballs.
So now that the NBA is taking more steps to address one of the most scrutinized aspects of its game, it’s doing so out of necessity more than epiphany. The board of governors adopted this new rest policy which states that teams must ensure that star players are available for national television and In-Season Tournament games and must maintain a balance between the number of a game without a star player in road and home games. , that there is a preference for such losses to occur at home.
The NBA also included in the new collective bargaining agreement a clause that requires players to play at least 65 games to qualify for MVP and All-NBA honors. This is to incentivize players to trigger the escalators of contracts by winning awards that appear in as many games as possible.
The arrival of the In-Season Tournament is another sign that the league knows that its regular season needs excitement. If the NBA commands a lot of money from TV partners that are no longer like bullets before, it will not be able to escape some resting practices used by the league.
“There’s a recognition throughout the league that we need to restore that principle, that this is an 82-game league. … There’s a statement of a principle that if you’re a healthy player in this league , the expectation is that you play,” Silver said.
That is not the only thing that has happened in recent years. Last season Boston’s Jayson Tatum played 74 games. He is the only player on the All-NBA first or second team to play at least 70. The 15 players who made three All-NBA teams played in 1,002 of a possible 1,230 games. In 2021-22, those 15 players appeared in 1,010 total games. In addition, there were many games that other All-Star players did not participate in that were not All-NBA.
Many of those games were missed for legitimate injury reasons, but the steps the league took this offseason suggest it believes the optics of healthy players sitting out is a serious issue. Silver said that the league understands that some players need to rest so they can be healthy for the playoffs, which is the most important product of the NBA. Older players, including LeBron James and Stephen Curry, may need games to preserve their bodies for the deep playoff run they hope to make. But the league doesn’t want Anthony Davis sitting the same night as James with the Lakers or Klay Thompson and Draymond Green sitting next to Curry in street clothes, which is something the Warriors have done.
Sports science has exploded across the league in recent years, with teams hiring more people on the field to examine how players eat, train, sleep and, yes, rest. The motivation is noble. More than any other league, the NBA has become popular around the world because of its ability to attract star players. James, Curry, Giannis Antetokounmpo, Luka Dončić and many other faces are the main attractions. They are bigger brands than the teams they play for.
In the interest of preserving money makers and extending their careers, teams are expanding their medical and athletic training staffs to find new and innovative ways to keep their players on the field. court
The 82-game season is an incredible grind for players, who can chew their bodies out before the most important time of the year for the league: the playoffs. Back-to-back home games, three games in four nights or four in seven are tough, not to mention arriving at a hotel at 3 a.m. to play that game. night. Add to that the insane workload that most of the league’s players experienced on the relentless AAU circuit as kids, and it’s a challenge for teams to keep them on the court and on television.
Interestingly, Silver said last week that “frankly, the science is inconclusive” on whether load management keeps players healthy long-term.
“The correlation isn’t there,” he said.
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But there’s no doubt that many teams think otherwise, or there’s no reason to institute policies like the one adopted last week to try to discourage teams from resting a star in those game on national television or resting with many stars in any game. Silver said the NBA will not try to disrupt teams’ game-by-game strategies, saying there will be a gradual implementation of the new rules to give teams time to adjust. . He also made it clear that the league cannot sit idle again.
Shortening time is not an option. That would cost too much money. So it’s time to tie the knot.
“We’re trying to deal with some of the most egregious examples,” Silver said. “We let the fans down, we let our teammates down by doing that.”
Some of the players, including Curry, said that the load management trend is something that is initiated and dictated by the teams, not the players. Silver said last week that there is a belief in some circles that a portion of the players see it as a status symbol that they deserve a night off. Either way, the league and the players have a lot to lose if they don’t find a way to minimize the frustration of fans and television partners on this front.
Years ago, the late Minnesota Timberwolves president and coach Flip Saunders often talked about the league losing sight of the bigger picture as load management became fashionable. In the endless pursuit of a competition, Saunders believes that the league risks alienating fans and television partners and forgets that, first and foremost, NBA basketball is in the business of entertainment.
“Without a doubt we are a business and part of the issue, in some cases the (television) partners are a proxy for the fans. … In terms of the size of the audience we reach when we are a network game, don’t rest your players that night and don’t rest a lot of star players on any given night,” Silver said.
As the league negotiates a new television rights deal with traditional networks and also considers options from tech giants like Apple and Amazon, it appears the bigger picture is finally coming through. in clearer focus. If the league wants to continue to grow revenue, the product it sells needs to feature headline acts as much as possible.
(Photo of Paul George and Kawhi Leonard: Adam Pantozzi/NBAE via Getty Images)