National Basketball Players Association Rumors

NBA, NBPA Agree To Enhanced Insurance Plan For Injuries

June 23rd, 2020 at 9:31am CST by Luke Adams

The NBA and the NBPA have agreed to put in place an enhanced insurance plan for players in Orlando, reports ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski (via Twitter).

According to Wojnarowski, the plan would cover career-ending injuries suffered this summer, whether they’re conventional basketball injuries or somehow related to COVID-19. The potential group policy would cover players for “several million dollars,” Woj adds.

There’s a belief among players that they’ll be at greater risk of injury this summer due to a lengthy hiatus and their limited access to basketball facilities during that layoff.

Players will get a training camp period and will have the opportunity to play a series of intersquad scrimmages in Orlando before the seeding game begin. However, the ramping-up period will look different than a typical fall training camp, as many teams will immediately have to fight for their playoff lives once games begin on July 30.

When Wojnarowski reported earlier this month that several players were pushing for an enhanced insurance plan, he noted that it would be difficult to prove that any injury suffered in Orlando is directly responsible for a reduction in a player’s future earnings unless it directly threatens the player’s career. Based on today’s report, it sounds as if the new agreement will only cover those career-threatening ailments rather than shorter-term injuries.

Bam Adebayo, De’Aaron Fox, Kyle Kuzma, Donovan Mitchell and Jayson Tatum were among the players said to be lobbying for enhanced insurance protection. All five are eligible for contract extensions this offseason.

NBA, NBPA Finalize Revised CBA Terms For Restart

June 23rd, 2020 at 8:53am CST by Luke Adams

The NBA and the National Basketball Players Association have finalized the terms of the revised Collective Bargaining Agreement for this summer’s Orlando restart, reports ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski (via Twitter).

As Wojnarowski explains, that means that the items outlined in Saturday’s memo to teams – such as the rescheduled date for the 2020 draft and the details of this week’s transaction window – have now been formally agreed upon.

There are still more items that the NBA and NBPA must negotiate and finalize, such as the start date and subsequent calendar for the 2020/21 season. However, this agreement represents an important step toward finishing the ’19/20 campaign.

Restart Notes: Howard, Lillard, Ranadive, Korver

June 18th, 2020 at 12:15pm CST by Luke Adams

In a statement sent to Shams Charania of The Athletic and Stadium, Lakers center Dwight Howard said that the players’ coalition expressing concerns with the NBA’s Orlando restart plan isn’t looking to derail the resumption of the season.

“Our main objective is to raise awareness and gain transparency on the things that concern us collectively,” Howard said. “Many of our fellow players are afraid to voice their concerns and are continuing to follow along with what they believe they have to.

“… In a time like this where we are fighting for equal rights, it would be contradictory if we told our own players to not play and do as we say,” Howard continued. “We are not here to dictate, nor do we have the power to do so. We want to make sure communication is taking place openly without fear. … If any one of us chooses to sit, it has nothing to do with another player’s right to play. Not once has any of us told one of our fellow brethren not to go to the Orlando Bubble Experiment and we stressed that in our meetings.”

A report earlier this week indicated that Kyrie Irving, who has been one of the leaders of the coalition voicing concerns about the NBA’s restart, has encouraged his Nets teammates not to go to Orlando. Howard’s statement suggests that’s not the case. The veteran big man added that he and other members of the players’ coalition are “in full support of our brothers whether we decide to enter or not enter the Orlando bubble.”

Here’s more on the NBA’s resumption:

Trail Blazers guard Damian Lillard said earlier this week that Irving and Howard “have a point” and that he doesn’t feel “100 percent comfortable” about resuming the season this summer, but that he’s willing to take the risk because of the impact that players’ salvaged salaries can have on their communities. “I can only speak for myself — but I think it goes for other guys as well — we are the financial support for our families and for a lot of our community,” Lillard said, per Ohm Youngmisuk of ESPN. “We bring a lot of that financial responsibility to support black businesses in black communities. So it makes a lot of sense for us (to return), from that standpoint.”
Even as the positive test rate and total number of COVID-19 cases in Florida continue to increase, Kings owner Vivek Ranadive said this week during a CNBC appearance that he’s confident in the NBA’s return-to-play plan, as Jason Anderson of The Sacramento Bee writes. “Statistically, it’s actually going to be safer to be in a bubble in Orlando than to stay home and go to a grocery store, so this has been very well thought through and I feel very confident that we will be in Orlando in a few weeks,” Ranadive said.
Bucks forward Kyle Korver said this week during a conversation with Richard Jefferson (video link) that he’d be willing to sit out the restart if his black teammates and friends felt it was the best way to bring about change, as Joe Coles of The Deseret News details.
The NBPA issued a press release on Wednesday that discussed a series of social-justice issues and initiatives and noted that the union is considering ideas for how players “can effectively continue their advocacy on the national stage occasioned by the games” in Orlando this summer.

Restart Notes: L. Williams, Lakers, NBPA, More

June 15th, 2020 at 3:51pm CST by Luke Adams

The Lakers and Clippers are among the NBA’s top championship contenders, but that doesn’t mean all their players are gung-ho about restarting the season. Clippers guard Lou Williams expressed on Instagram why he feels as if resuming play could distract from social-justice causes, while Lakers center Dwight Howard conveyed a similar sentiment over the weekend.

Howard’s agent, Charles Briscoe, told Dave McMenamin of ESPN on Sunday that his client has yet to make a decision on playing basketball this summer, while other Lakers players said that there’s still plenty of time for the team to get on the same page.

“(There’s) no divide,” one Lakers player told McMenamin.

Here’s more on the NBA’s proposed restart:

The National Basketball Players Association has scheduled another call for 5:00 pm ET today, with all players invited to participate, tweets John Gambadoro of Arizona Sports 98.7. We’ll see if we get a better sense after that call of how the league and union may try to address certain players’ concerns about the return-to-play plan.
Alex Kennedy of HoopsHype spoke to agents and executives to get a feel for whether teams would use the ability to sign a replacement player for an individual who tests positive for COVID-19 this summer. “I think as long as a team doesn’t have multiple players who get sick at the same time, they won’t sign anyone,” one general manager said. “I think most teams will just wait for their sick player to return.”
Tim Bontemps of ESPN explores what will be at stake when the NBA resumes play, ranging from the impact the playoff results will have on Giannis Antetokounmpo‘s future or LeBron James‘ legacy to what happens to the league if the bubble plan doesn’t work.

Michele Roberts: “A Player Is Going To Test Positive”

June 13th, 2020 at 6:31pm CST by Arthur Hill

Michele Roberts, executive director of the National Basketball Players Association, admits there’s no way to fully protect players from COVID-19 while they’re in Orlando, writes Gary Washburn of The Boston Globe. Roberts understands that players are entering a risky situation, but said the only alternative to resuming the season under these conditions was to wait for a vaccine and possibly sit out two years.

“That’s the only realistic mind-set you can have going into this. A player is going to test positive,” she said. “It’s not any more of this ‘if’, it’s ‘when’ and what can I do to mitigate against the ‘when.’ When it happens, if I’m not successful, what treatment is available to me, what are my chances of being really, really sick, and how are you detecting the presence of an infection? Honestly, I don’t think this is any different than what any American has to come to grips with.”

Roberts emphasized that no player is being forced to participate in Orlando and there will be no repercussions other than loss of salary. An increasing number of players are objecting to the restart plan and the restrictive nature of the bubble environment.

“I don’t believe any player would say this was forced upon them, it’s not,” Roberts said. “Not a single player has to play. This is not involuntary servitude. I don’t have to work. They don’t have to work. But it’s of course a mitigation of risk with the players. On this health and safety protocol, I’m satisfied that it can’t be any better than this. But I’m candid that it’s not bulletproof.”

Roberts addresses several other topics in the interview:

Players have become more knowledgeable about the virus:

“At the very beginning when we were being told that this was a disease that people like me [middle-aged] had to worry about, it was more of an annoyance for the players, except for those who had family members my age. But it was not something they thought was going to have this kind of an impact on their lives or their livelihood. As time went on and the seriousness was revealed there were times when players were very concerned about it, especially when it became clear it was not confined to folks over 60. I got really serious questions. ‘Is this something I need to be worried about? Can it kill me? Can it impact my ability to continue to play basketball?'”

She believes most players support resuming the season:

“I think the players are where they want to be. They want to give it a shot and if it doesn’t work, well, we tried. Hopefully nothing catastrophic will happen and we can just figure out Plan B. If the worst would happen and it would spread, we shut it down. This is the virus. I’m going to be disheartened, but I’m not going to be surprised because there’s no scientific or medical ability to protect against it. The players know it. The teams know it. We’re doing absolutely everything we can to mitigate it. If I didn’t think we were, that the league was half-stepping, then I would recommend with every ounce of my being that our players not even think about playing again. But that’s thankfully not the case.”

The union hasn’t endorsed Dec. 1 as the start date for the 2020/21 season:

“Dec. 1 is not an attractive option. Those are tough questions that have to be resolved. How do we address the revenue challenges this virus has created and will create next season? I don’t know when they’re going to have fans back in the arena. I don’t think we’re going to have them in October. There are a number of factors that will impact when the season will begin. I don’t know if we’re going to have a second spike. What’s the virus going to look like? And if you’re going to talk about a compressed season, we were able to reduce the amount of back-to-back games, the notion of returning to that and the obvious injury risk that come along with that, is not attractive. But nothing will happen without the players signing off. That’s for sure.”

More Details Emerge From Friday’s Conference Call

June 13th, 2020 at 5:30pm CST by Arthur Hill

We relayed details last night about a conference call regarding player objections to the plan to restart the NBA season in Orlando. More information on that call, which involved in excess of 80 players, has been released by Shams Charania of The Athletic.

Charania confirms that Kyrie Irving was the leader of the effort to make players reconsider their support of finishing the season. He spoke first and offered a direct message to his peers, telling them, “I don’t support going into Orlando. I’m not with the systematic racism and the bull–. … Something smells a little fishy. Whether we want to admit it or not, we are targeted as black men every day we wake up.”

Avery Bradley, who was outspoken throughout the conversation, was the first player to follow Irving’s comments. He encouraged the players to take a stand and to use the opportunity to “play chess, not checkers.” Other prominent names on the call included union president Chris Paul, Kevin Durant, Carmelo Anthony, Dwight Howard and Donovan Mitchell.

Players have been involved in conversations for the past two weeks, sources tell Charania, expressing concerns about the games in Orlando and the restrictive conditions that are rumored to be part of the bubble environment. The opposition began among “rank-and-file” players, with Irving and Durant providing prominent voices.

Sources offered Charania a few more tidbits from the conference call:

Anthony emphasized the need for player unity and the importance of conveying a single message. He also urged all 80 players on the call to donate $25K to a cause of their choice.
CJ McCollum told players they have to be prepared for financial setbacks if they choose not to play and the possibility that owners will nullify the current Collective Bargaining Agreement.
Howard warned that resuming the season will distract from the social justice issues the country is focused on. He encouraged players to use the moment as a catalyst for change.
Mitchell talked about players “being behind the 8-ball” by being forced into a competitive environment after being idle for so long. “We’re taking a big injury risk,” he told his fellow players.
NBPA leadership doesn’t expect fans to be allowed into games at any point during the 2020/21 season, which would result in another huge revenue loss for the league.

Young Stars Want NBA To Provide Insurance For Career-Threatening Injuries

June 13th, 2020 at 3:28pm CST by Arthur Hill

Some of the league’s best young players talked to the National Basketball Players Association on Friday about creating an insurance system financed by the league that would protect them in case of career-threatening injuries when play resumes in Orlando, according to ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski.

Sources tell Wojnarowski that Bam Adebayo, De’Aaron Fox, Kyle Kuzma, Donovan Mitchell and Jayson Tatum were part of a call with NBPA executive director Michele Roberts and senior counsel Ron Klempner. All five players will be eligible for rookie-scale extensions this offseason, and they want the union to negotiate insurance policies with the NBA that would protect their future earnings.

Players in general believe they’re facing a higher-than-normal risk of serious injury after not being able to play for more than three months. Adebayo, Fox, Kuzma, Mitchell and Tatum are hoping their combined voices will help win protections for players on all 22 teams involved in the restart.

The league has been in talks with the union about providing some form of protection for players who are either injured or suffer severe cases of coronavirus during the games in Orlando, according to sources. Negotiations are continuing on possible alterations to the Collective Bargaining Agreement before play resumes.

Sources estimate to Wojnarowski that policies for players on the brink of a maximum extension could cost up to $500K to protect them through the end of the playoffs. He adds that apart from a career-ending incident, it would be difficult to prove that any injury is directly responsible for a reduction in future earnings.

Growing Concern About NBA’s Restart Plan

June 12th, 2020 at 1:19pm CST by Luke Adams

Even as the NBA works to finalize specific dates for various aspects of its resumed season, there’s “growing concern” about the plan among players, according to Howard Beck of Bleacher Report (via Twitter).

Taylor Rooks of Bleacher Report (via Twitter) reports that approximately 150 players are planning to take part in a conference call tonight to discuss what they can do to take a stand expressing their concerns and reservations about the league’s Orlando plan.

Beck (Twitter link) hears that up to 200 players may be involved in that call, adding that NBPA vice president Kyrie Irving has been a “driving force” in raising concerns and organizing player discussions. Irving believes that the idea of not returning to play should be considered, given the importance of the anti-racism activism currently happening in the U.S. and around the world, tweets Chris Haynes of Yahoo Sports.

According to Beck, one agent estimated that about two-thirds of the league’s top 40 players may refuse to play based on the current information presented by the league.

As we’ve detailed in previous stories, players’ concerns are related to their health and safety, spending significant time away from their families, and directing the spotlight away from social justice issues. Beck suggests that the proposed restrictions involving freedom of movement within the so-called “bubble” in Orlando are also a key factor.

Although players will technically be allowed to leave the campus-like Disney environment after reporting in July, as Jared Dudley explained last month, recent reports have suggested they’d be subject to a 10-day quarantine period for doing so. In other words, leaving the “bubble” likely wouldn’t be a viable option for a player once the season officially resumes, since it would mean missing at least four or five games.

On top of that, as ESPN’s Zach Lowe (video link) and Tom Haberstroh of NBC Sports (Twitter link) have pointed out today, the Disney support staff involved in the restart won’t be subject to the same protocols as players, coaches, and other NBA personnel. Those Disney staffers would be free to come and go from the premises as needed, without necessarily being tested daily for COVID-19.

Players who are already apprehensive about spending weeks or months on the Disney campus may push back against the idea of doing so if they feel as if the “bubble” isn’t really a bubble and that their safety could be compromised by support staffers.

Keith Smith of Yahoo Sports (Twitter links) hears from a Walt Disney World source that there would be Disney employees willing to stay in the “bubble” for months on end to help complete the season and reduce health risks, but it’s unclear whether Disney and/or the NBA would ask those staffers to do so.

Many Players Disappointed About Not Getting Vote On Restart

June 12th, 2020 at 11:26am CST by Luke Adams

When the National Basketball Players Association approved the NBA’s plan last Friday to resume the 2019/20 season in Orlando, only the union’s executive committee and individual team representatives participated in that vote.

That hasn’t sat well with a number of players around the NBA, according to Chris Haynes of Yahoo Sports, who hears from sources that a “significant” number of players are disappointed that not everyone was given the opportunity to vote on the matter.

There’s a sense that many players’ voices weren’t heard on what could be a “life-changing” decision, sources tell Yahoo Sports. Some agents have encouraged their clients to speak up and to talk to the NBPA about pushing for a more collaborative system, Haynes adds.

According to Haynes, some players have been reluctant to express their opinions because most of the league’s superstars are “adamant” about finishing the season if the NBA institutes adequate safety protocols. Haynes notes that a faction of players remain uncertain about the resumption of the season due to the lack of information available about those coronavirus-related health and safety protocols, which are still being negotiated.

Interestingly, as ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski and analyst Matt Barnes have alluded to, a number of players are also taking into account the recent social justice protests following the death of George Floyd as they weigh their options. According to Haynes, some players believe the optics of a predominantly black league resuming play in a bubble to “entertain the masses” and to salvage TV deals aren’t great.

“What message are we sending by agreeing to this during this time?” one player said to Haynes. “We’re out here marching and protesting, and yet we all leave our families in these scary times and gather to perform at a place where the owners won’t be at? What type of sense does that make? We’ll be going backwards. That place isn’t that magical.”

Conversely, Nets guard and NBPA vice president Garrett Temple told Malika Andrews of ESPN that he thinks playing games – and earning pay checks – is an effective way of combating the systemic oppression of black people.

“The difference in the economic gap between white America and black America is astronomical,” Temple said. “I can’t in good conscience tell my brethren to throw away millions of dollars in order to create change that I don’t see the direct impact of — if there was a direct impact of laws changing, that would be a different story.”

Appearing on J.J. Redick‘s podcast (video link), Pacers guard Malcolm Brogdon, another NBPA VP, acknowledged both sides of that issue.

“(Some) guys are going to say, ‘The black community and my people are going through too much for me to basically be distracted with basketball, I’m not going to prioritize this over the black community, I’m going to sit out,” Brogdon said. “”And then there’s another group of guys – and these are all black perspectives – who are going to say, ‘No, this is the most amount of money I’m going to make in my lifetime. It doesn’t make sense to hand this money back. I can do so much good in my community if I have this money.’

“… My thing is, if you’re going to sit out, you have to have demands. You have to have policies that you want to see change,” Brogdon continued. “There has to be something very organized and strategized to go into that.”

Marc Stein of The New York Times (Twitter link) reported earlier today that the NBA and NBPA are still working through the health and safety protocols for the resumed season. Once those protocols are in place, players with safety concerns should have more information to make informed decisions. However, the social-justice concerns that players have may require further discussions between the league and union.

Not All Players Bullish On NBA’s Restart Plan

June 10th, 2020 at 5:07pm CST by Luke Adams

A faction of NBA players has been discussing as a group whether restarting the season in Orlando is a good idea, according to ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski, who reports (via Twitter) that “several dozen” players took part in a conference call within the last 24 hours to talk about the issue.

Even as the NBA and NBPA get closer to reaching an agreement on many details tied to the league’s return to play, some players are hesitant to fully embrace the plan and have been discussing issues related to the return, including concerns about their families, COVID-19, and social justice, says Wojnarowski.

Players aren’t expected to be permitted to bring family members into the Orlando bubble until September, after the first round of the postseason concludes. Tim Reynolds of The Associated Press tweets that he has heard “many” players are unhappy about that fact.

Meanwhile, coronavirus cases appear to be on the rise in Florida, including in the Orange County region, where the NBA’s return would take place, as Reynolds tweets. Additionally, NBA analyst and former player Matt Barnes told Josiah Johnson (Twitter link) over the weekend that he has spoken to some players who want the rest of the season canceled in order to focus on addressing injustices in the Black community.

It’s not clear, based on Woj’s reporting, what percentage of players are having reservations about the resumption of the season or if their concerns will slow down a potential agreement between the league and the players’ union. However, even if those concerned players are outnumbered, that doesn’t necessarily mean they’ll be forced to report to Orlando.

According to Wojnarowski (via Twitter), the NBA and NBPA will likely agree on a provision that will ensure players aren’t subjected to discipline if they decide to stay home this summer when play resumes. Those players would lose a portion of their salaries for the games they miss, but otherwise wouldn’t be fined or suspended.

It remains to be seen how serious an issue this could be as the NBA gears up for a restart — we should get a better sense in the coming days and weeks about how many players are reluctant to participate and whether they’ll feel pressured to do so.