The Mavericks have four players with confirmed cases of COVID-19, Brad Townsend of the Dallas Morning News tweets. A pair of rotation players tested positive on Monday, according to ESPN’s Tim MacMahon and Zach Lowe (Twitter link).
None of the players who have tested positive have been named publicly due to privacy issues. Mavericks veterans Josh Richardson, Dorian Finney-Smith and Jalen Brunson were self-isolating as of Friday, and Maxi Kleber joined that list over the weekend.
The NBA postponed Monday’s game between the Mavericks and Pelicans due to issues related to COVID-19 and the Mavericks’ game at Charlotte on Wednesday could also be in jeopardy.
Due to contact tracing, the Mavericks and the NBA could not say with certainty that Dallas would have at least eight non-infected/bodily healthy players for Monday’s game, Townsend notes in another tweet.
According to ESPN’s Bobby Marks (Twitter link), Dallas can file for a hardship exception on each of the four players that tested positive, even though none of the players have missed three consecutive games. The normal procedure to request the exception is to have four players miss three consecutive games and be out two additional weeks.
Several other teams, including the Heat, Celtics and Sixers, have been dealing with major personnel issues due to the coronavirus. The league’s Board of Governors is meeting on Tuesday to discuss potential changes to the protocols that have been in place this season.
They should change up the hardship exception abd allow teams to sign a 10 day player as soon as someone tests positive. That way they might have less cancellations.
true. well, they should add more hardship exceptions like two per team or something if thats even possible. or they could change da maximum player limit to 20 in order to prevent game cancellations.
They should’ve just had a Covid Reserve team where each team can have three guys who basically stay in shape and stay ready in case an outbreak happens to a team and they get call in. Maybe have their contract be less than the minimum and it doesn’t count against the cap. I think they should’ve thought of something.
That’s not a bad idea. It could be similar to an NFL practice squad
ikr should have extras in case covid depletes them.