The NBA, like essentially every professional sports league worldwide, is still on hiatus. While governments are trying to figure out the best way to control the spread of COVID-19, leagues like the NBA are staying on the sideline, in part because it is awfully hard to practice social distancing while engaging in any sort of physical competition.
For basketball fans, it leads to the question of when, exactly, we’ll see games taking place again. Adam Silver isn’t 100 percent certain, going as far as to say that canceling the season altogether can’t be taken off the table, but the league is considering a number of options. One owner is taking a more optimistic approach, saying that he thinks games could start back up before the calendar turns to June.
Mark Cuban appeared on WFAA in Dallas, saying that he hopes the NBA can “lead the way out of this” and made what he claimed is an informed guess on when we’ll see basketball again.
“No one has perfect information right now, and so all decisions are tough,” Cuban said. “But if I had to guess based off the people I’ve talked to at the CDC and other places, I would say that the over/under would be June 1, and I’m taking the under, that hopefully by the middle of May, we’re starting to get back to normal and the NBA is playing games. Maybe not with fans, but we’re playing it because sports plays such an important role. You know, people want something to cheer for, people want something to rally around, people want something to be excited about.”
Cuban was asked about what he believed needs to happen for this to come to fruition, and the Dallas Mavericks’ owner identified one specific thing: scientists identifying “a therapy that we know minimizes the impact of the virus.” He did stress that it doesn’t necessarily have to be a cure, just something that can help those who are suffering.
“Once we do that, then we have a path out,” Cuban said. “We’re not there yet, but we’re getting closer and closer.
“Once we have a medical light at the end of the tunnel where we know where the worst-case is, then ok, we can start venturing outside and being in groups of 10 instead of being by ourselves,” Cuban continued. “And then groups of 25, and then 50, and then go from there. So I think that’s the first step, and I think that’s gonna happen a little bit faster than we originally expected.”
It is important to stress that Cuban could just be looking as this through a pair of rose-colored glasses, and at a time with so much uncertainty, it’s impossible to know what is going to happen tomorrow, let alone by the time mid-May rolls around. In fact, a piece in the Wall Street Journal on Tuesday indicated that some scientists believe we could be months away from answers on potential treatments. But of course, here’s to hoping the stuff that Cuban mentioned in here comes to fruition, scientists are able to figure out how coronavirus can be treated, and we’re all able to return to some sense of normalcy as soon as possible.
