Adam Silver Says ‘I Don’t Have an Answer’ for Fan Frustration With Load Management

NBA Commissioner Adam Silver understands fan frustration with the concept of load management, but he does not see it as an overarching problem that’s hurting the league.

“It’s not just gameplay, but teams deciding not to practice, teams deciding to, you know, do whatever they can to maintain players being in an optimal position to compete during games,” Silver told reporters Saturday.

“This isn’t a new issue. There’s nothing particularly happening this season that we haven’t seen happening over the last several seasons. I understand it from a fan standpoint that if you are particularly buying tickets to a particular game and that player isn’t playing. I don’t have a good answer for that other than this is a deep league with incredible competition.”

The concept of load management has become increasingly polarizing in recent years, as star players—particularly veterans—sit out half of a back-to-back or with small injuries they may have played through in past generations.

While some critics have used “load management” as a way to question the toughness of the current crop of NBA players, the concept of sitting players is more a byproduct of data-driven management by teams. Advancements in sports science and analytics have given teams hard data on how player bodies recover, and teams have increasingly chosen to play the long game by sitting players who could be more at risk for long-term injury.

Silver cited the medical data as the main reason he prefers to avoid criticizing players for sitting out games.

“The world that we used to have where it was just, ‘Get out there and play through injuries,’ for example, I don’t think that’s appropriate,” Silver said. “Clearly, I mean, at the end of the day, these are human beings—many of you talk to and know well—who are often playing through enormous pain, who play through all kinds of aches and pains on a regular basis.

“The suggestion, I think, that these men, in the case in the NBA, somehow should just be out there more for its own sake, I don’t buy into.”

The NBA has made several changes to its schedule, reducing back-to-backs, eliminating back-to-back-to-backs and instituting a weeklong All-Star break, in an effort to give players maximum possible recovery time.

The ultimate issue is an 82-game regular season is likely too taxing on player bodies, but the push for creating the maximum possible revenue makes shortening the season highly unlikely. In other words, load management—and fan frustration—is likely here to stay.