The NBA commissioner, Adam Silver, conducted a press conference after the league voted on its expansion. During the press conference, he also explained in detail why he feels the league should not consider the 65-game rule a failure.
This rule came under scrutiny from the NBA Players’ Association (NBPA) due to its impact on Cade Cunningham, who fell five games short of the threshold due to a collapsed lung.
Adam Silver refused to admit that the rule has shortcomings and is not helping the basketball product in the league. But he left the door open for negotiations.
“In fairness to the players’ association, I would never say there’s not, there’s something we’re not willing to talk to them about. I mean, things come up all the time on both sides. I would only say take a step back.”
“I mean, it is only the 3rd year now that the 65-game rule has been put in effect, and a few years ago, when I was standing in front of all of you, you weren’t asking me about tanking. You were asking me about load management, and you were saying, ‘What in the world are you guys going to do about the fact that star players aren’t playing enough games?’
“And we did several things, but one of the things we did in agreement with the players’ association was to put in place a 65-game rule to ensure that to be eligible, you know, to be an MVP or All-NBA or All-Defense, you needed to play those 65 games.”
“We always knew when there’s a line you draw that somebody’s going to fall on the other side of that line, and it may feel unfair in that particular instance, you know, let’s see what happens at the end of this year.”
“So, by the way, to Cade Cunningham, he’s an incredible player, and I’m sorry that he’s injured. Um, and you know, can’t wait to see him back on the floor. But having said that, you know, we also have to remember that to the extent that one player is no longer eligible, some other player will then be All-NBA and will slot into that spot.”
“So I’m not ready to stand here and say I don’t think it’s working. I think it is working. I think if you look, you know, at the numbers, the implementation of this rule, the numbers were going in the wrong direction.”
“I may have this a little bit off, but I think in the three years before we adopted this rule, almost a third of all NBA players had not played 80% of the games, and that was a huge issue for the league. In the same way we’re addressing tanking now, people said, what are you going to do about that?”
“And so, not surprisingly, the same underlying theme around tanking goes to player participation. Are the incentives aligned? And there was a general agreement between the players’ association and us that we needed to do something about that.”
“And the result was to have the 65 game rule, like could it be 68, could it be 62, that was the product of a negotiation, but I generally think it’s worked that along with the player participation policy, there’s not nearly as much discussion around load management as there was in part because the teams and the players have responded.”
“You see them on the floor now, so now we have a separate issue that we’re dealing with in terms of tanking, and we’ll deal with that, and I get it. It’s part of my job, and there are always new issues.”
“But I’m not ready to say, standing here today, that because there may be a sense of unfairness for one player, that means the rule doesn’t work,” concluded the NBA commissioner.
These comments did not sit well with NBA fans, especially the Pistons’ fans who feel Cade Cunningham was not load managing and has become a victim of a rule that shouldn’t apply to him.
The Pistons’ All-Star was averaging 24.5 points, 9.9 assists, and 5.6 rebounds in the 61 games he played before his injury. He shot 46.1% from the field and 34.6% from beyond the arc.
In my opinion, the flaw in that argument is that any rule cannot be changed or amended midway through the season when some other players may have played through injuries in order to reach that pre-decided threshold.
Thus, I agree with Commissioner Adam Silver when he says it is not right to say the rule is not working when there is only a sense of unfairness for one player. Do you agree with the NBA commissioner’s reasoning? Let us know what you think in the comments section.
