Originally posted on Hoops Rumors | By Alex Kirschenbaum | Last updated 8/20/20
NBA commissioner Adam Silver told ESPN’s Rachel Nichols ahead of Thursday night’s draft lottery that he now expects the league’s previously estimated December 1 start for the 2020-21 season to be pushed back, per Brian Windhorst of ESPN.
In explaining his thinking, Silver indicated that he would prefer to have fans be able to attend games in person next season, as he told Nichols:
“I think our No. 1 goal is to get fans back in our arenas. So my sense is, in working with the [National Basketball] Players Association, if we could push back even a little longer and increase the likelihood of having fans in arenas, that’s what we would be targeting.”
Such a goal may push the NBA’s next season back a bit further than previously anticipated. Currently, the coronavirus pandemic has made gatherings of large crowds so dangerous that stateside fan attendance for large concerts, indoor movie theaters and sporting events has largely been postponed. The United States saw 43,798 new confirmed cases of COVID-19 on Wednesday.
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