- Load management is expected to be as popular as ever in 2024
- Fans want to see action taken against dwindling player attendance
- Load management is an underrated problem for the NBA
With active trade requests in Philadelphia and Portland, the NBA media has been dominated by discourse involving player empowerment. With James Harden pretty much holding his team captive, the Sixers are preparing for months of chaos with Harden as he awaits a trade that may never come. The same could be said of the Blazers and their disgruntled star, Damian Lillard.
Sadly this type of behavior from the basketball elites is nothing new in the modern NBA and it’s a big problem, but the embrace of load management could be the biggest problem of all.
Top players very rarely suit up for 90% of their games anymore, and it’s ruining the fan experience. When you buy a ticket today, there’s a decent chance that the best players on either team will choose to sit out for whatever reason they can think to come up with.
Not only is the practice a waste of money for fans who are paying to see the stars perform, but it’s also detrimental to the teams taking part.
“Harden calling Morey a liar will not turn NBA fans and cause them to go elsewhere. All they are doing is eye-rolling, laughing, memeing, whatever. What’s bad for the NBA is load management,” argued Rick Kamla on Sirius XM NBA Radio. “When they spend money to see a star, and that star is resting, and their child is crying in the third-row seat that they spent $350 for, that is bad for the NBA.”
The Clippers are the perfect case study for the impact of load management. Despite picking and choosing when to take time off throughout the week, Paul George and Kawhi Leonard have still somehow been ravaged by injuries for most of their time together.
When the duo has been healthy, they’ve often had trouble winning consistently thanks to poor team chemistry and constantly changing lineups.
Of course, the Clips are far from the only team employing this method. In the past few years, we’ve seen pretty much every big-name star sit out games while healthy for the sake of preserving their durability.
Will The NBA Address Load Management?
Currently, the NBA doesn’t have any set protocol against load management, but they did set a 65-game minimum requirement for award eligibility. This rule may not change much, but it is a very promising step in limiting how many games players miss in a season. Now, if they want to earn the highest accolades, they’ll have to play as many games as they can.
Obviously, more steps will need to be taken if the league wants to eliminate load management for good. One important move may be shortening the NBA season to lessen the load and mileage on players’ bodies.
For now, though, the fans will have to live with load management as a normal thing and we’ve seen enough of it to know that it’s not good for the league.
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