Damian Lillard is right.
The Portland Trail Blazers star point guard is the leader of a team seeded ninth in the Western Conference. And if his team doesn’t have a chance to fight for eighth place and make the playoffs when the NBA resumes its season amid the coronavirus pandemic, Lillard says he’ll be with his team — he just won’t play.
“If we come back and they’re just like, ‘We’re adding a few games to finish the regular season,’ and they’re throwing us out there for meaningless games and we don’t have a true opportunity to get into the playoffs, I’m going to be with my team because I’m a part of the team,” Lillard told Yahoo! Sports. “But I’m not going to be participating. I’m telling you that right now.”
The Trail Blazers are one of several teams whose fate in the 2019-20 season hangs in the balance as the NBA decides how it wants to resume its season.
The league has been on hiatus since March 11, when Rudy Gobert became the first NBA player to test positive for the coronavirus. Since then, more than a dozen players and personnel have tested positive — including four Brooklyn Nets players, Knicks owner James Dolan, and several players Gobert had come in contact with — as the virus took hold in the United States.
Businesses are beginning to reopen, and the NBA is exploring avenues to pick up where it left off. All indications are pointing toward a resumed season at Walt Disney World Resorts in Orlando, where the league will create a bubble for its teams to play and live for the remainder of the season.
But what will the season look like when it eventually resumes? If there’s any time to get creative, it’s now, as the league attempts to salvage what’s left of a season that was cut short.
“If we come back and I don’t have an opportunity to make the playoffs, I will show up to work, I’ll be at practice and I’ll be with my team. I’m going to do all that and then I’m going to be sitting right on that bench during the games,” Lillard told Yahoo. “If they come back and say it’s something like a tournament, play-in style, between the No. 7 and No. 12 seeds, if we’re playing for playoff spots, then I think that’s perfect.”
A play-in style tournament is an avenue the NBA is exploring. The league surveyed the general managers of each of its 30 teams, and one idea floated in that survey is a “Playoffs Plus” option. That option could potentially include a play-in tournament for teams on the bubble of the playoffs to compete for the seventh and eighth seeds of the conference.
It could also look like international competition with a group stage leading into the playoffs.
A Playoffs Plus option wouldn’t only benefit Lillard’s Trail Blazers. Portland is in a three-way tie with New Orleans and Sacramento, each 21.5 games back from the No. 1 seed Los Angeles Lakers. A play-in tournament could give each of those teams a chance to upset the No. 7 Dallas Mavericks or No. 8 Memphis Grizzlies.
There’s also the situation in the Eastern Conference. The Nets and Orlando Magic are firmly situated into the standings at seventh and eighth, but Bradley Beal’s Washington Wizards — despite sitting 5.5 games behind Orlando — are a team that can be a handful on any given night.
Beal is averaging over 30 points per game this season and is the league leader in scoring since Jan. 1. He was averaging almost 38 points per game in the 10 games leading into the hiatus, including back-to-back 50-point games. Beal’s Wizards only went 4-6 in those 10 games and entered the hiatus with a 24-40 record, but a play-in tournament would make things interesting.
In a play-in game against the Nets without both Kyrie Irving and Kevin Durant — or against the eight-place Orlando Magic — Beal would be the best player on the floor.
“We’re uncertain of, if we come back, how many games are we gonna play?” he said on an appearance on the “All The Smoke” podcast. “Especially teams like us who are on the cusp at ninth who’ve got like four or five games that we’re out of. Do we get those games or do we not get those games. It’s tough.”
On May 12, NBA commissioner Adam Silver told his Board of Governors the league would reach a decision on restarting the season in a timeframe of two-to-four weeks. The lower end of that timeline is swiftly approaching.
The league and its players have their sights set on resuming play, as long as they can do so safely. A play-in tournament of some sort would add an extra wrinkle to give teams motivation to play for the playoffs.
It’s also a way to keep Damian Lillard happy.
“Right now, I’m just in a space where I want to come back and play. And if we start playing, I’ll be ready to play. But if the league says it’s only taking playoff teams, then I’m off to a head start in my summer training,” he said. “I’ll be pissed off because I feel like they basically stopped the season and went straight into the playoffs. We’re chasing the team with the toughest schedule in the league and we’re in ninth place. That would be weak, but it is what it is.”
