Adam Silver Provides an Update on Resumption of NBA: For Now Things Don’t Look Good

Amidst the uncertainty over the resumption of the league, NBA commissioner said that there wasn’t much to make projections around it. He said that it would be at least the end of the month until the NBA could make any decision.

“Essentially what I’ve told my folks over the last week is we should just accept that at least for the month of April, we won’t be in a position to make any decisions,” Silver said in an interview with TNT’s Ernie Johnson. “I don’t think that necessarily means that, on May 1, we will be [in that position], but at least I know that just to settle everyone down a little bit.”

He said that however hard the league might try to make a return; it is currently difficult to make any predictions.

NBA would return with the regular season in a “perfect world”

Since a few days after the league’s suspension, many started believing that it was the end of the regular season, even if the NBA salvages something out of the season. But Silver believed that ideally, the league with return with the regular season. However, he also spoke about increasing uncertainties He said that while the league was initially discussing scenarios for a restart, the discussion has now shifted to a possible return date.

“Initially, through the first week, two weeks, we were looking at more specific scenarios,” Silver said. “If we start this date, what would it mean for the regular season? When would the playoffs begin? When would they conclude? And, again, what I’ve learned over the last few weeks is we just have too little information to make those sort of projections.”

Silver concluded by saying that health and safety will always remain their primary concern. The league will only resume after they give these factors due consideration.

“I think we’re all realizing how much we miss live sports,” Silver said. “I follow every sport that’s out there … for a large segment of our country, we live and die on sports. We consume enormous amounts of it, and this is unprecedented.

“[But] to all of the families watching this, I know the NBA is a big part of their lives, but we want to assure everybody that, while we are putting the health and safety of everybody first, we’re looking at every possibility to get our players back on the floor and play NBA basketball again.”