Report: John Wall, DeMarcus Cousins And Other Rockets Are In A 7-Day Quarantine

The first team to have to postpone a game this season was the Houston Rockets after they were unable to field an eight-man roster for their season opener with the Thunder on Wednesday. A number of players, including John Wall and DeMarcus Cousins, were in isolation after contact tracing from a gathering of players to get haircuts earlier in the week with someone who tested positive.

On top of that, James Harden was ruled ineligible to play after he had violated COVID-19 protocols by going to an event at a club earlier in the week. Harden is being required to return four consecutive negative tests, backdated to Tuesday, meaning he could possibly play on Saturday. The rest of the Rockets, however, are in a much more precarious situation, and as such their Saturday game with the Blazers and their Monday game with the Nuggets also could be in doubt.

According to The Athletic’s Shams Charania, a Rockets staffer has tested positive, putting Eric Gordon and others are involved in contact tracing protocols in relation to that staffer. On top of that, the league’s contact tracing guidelines mandate a 7-day quarantine for those determined to be close contacts, meaning Wall, Cousins, and the rest are currently dealing with that.

Depending on the date that gathering took place, it’s possible those players would all be out through the Nuggets game due to quarantine protocols. It is a rather disastrous start to the season for a Houston team that had plenty of turmoil without an apparent COVID-19 outbreak to deal with. We’ll learn more in the coming days about the status of of the Rockets upcoming games, but it seems that, at the least, there has to be serious concern about whether they’ll have players for Saturday and the potential for that game to also be postponed.