The NBA is highly regarded as the most up to date with their players amongst the five major American professional sports leagues. Commissioner Adam Silver has done a fantastic job in communicating with the Players Association, while trying to find mediums on issues that need to be addressed.
One issue that came to the surface during the 2016-17 season was the decision for many of the top-tier teams to rest their players during the regular season. Although the rigors of the 82-game season can be quite bothersome, the NBA found out first hand the displeasure of their fan base.
Since then, Commissioner Silver and his team have been working non-stop towards finding a solution. After some discussion with an anonymous source, Jeff Zillgitt of USA Today found out first hand that the NBA will soon implement a new policy:
NBA owners are expected to approve player-resting rules in September designed to cut back on teams benching healthy players for regular-season games, a person with direct knowledge of the situation told USA TODAY Sports.
The rules are expected to be in place for the 2017-18 season, hopefully in conjunction with some tweaks to the NBA schedule. The main concern coming from the players has been the increased focus on back-to-back games, especially involving ones that requires travel. The NBA has tried to combat that issue, by agreeing to start the NBA season 10 days earlier and including more rest days into the season.
While Commissioner Silver and his team understood that resting was turning into a problem, the main issue didn’t occur until fans expressed their displeasure with the situation. After spending their hard earned money, families would have to find out moments prior to the game that the star player visiting will no longer be playing.
By cutting down back-to-backs and limiting travel around the key dates, fans can witness these star players healthy and in action. Silver also suggested not resting multiple stars during the same game, especially during road games. By no way was Silver suggesting that banged up players do not rest, but he and his team want to find the right balance between healing and intentionally resting healthy players.
