SportsTalk,On October 12th, according to Tim Bontemps, the NBA had already instilled an “82 game” mentality in players before the regular season.
According to reports, NBA Executive Vice President and Basketball Operations Director Joe Dumas is discussing this matter while the NBA is starting to negotiate a new national broadcasting agreement. The NBA is attempting to increase the participation of players this season, including new policies such as a minimum of 65 games for regular season individual honors and the inability to rotate two star players in the same game.
Dumas and NBA Basketball Strategy and Analysis Executive Vice President Evan Walsh both acknowledge that the league’s actions are related to ongoing broadcast agreement negotiations.
This is a part of it, “Dumas said.” For any such thing, this has never been a thing. All the relevant things are important… fans, players, broadcasters. Pretending it’s not the same thing is dishonesty
Walsh said: I also believe that we don’t need broadcasters to tell us that players are unwilling to participate in All Star games when the team is resting. This is very obvious to us. Ultimately, we are working hard to serve our fans. This is the case, as we are negotiating future broadcasting agreements, so it needs to take responsibility. We are in the middle of all parties, and we believe that these issues need to be resolved independently of any external parties.
