NBA commissioner Adam Silver downplays looming league issues

SALT LAKE CITY — When it comes to facing some of the NBA’s biggest issues, Commissioner Adam Silver seemed to be focusing only on the silver linings.

On the problem of superstar availability and the nebulous designation of “load management”? “I don’t think the issue is quite what some suggest,” Silver said.

What about superstars requesting trades while under contract, like Kyrie Irving and Kevin Durant pushing their way out of Brooklyn? Silver parsed words, saying he was really only opposed to players making “public” demands to be traded.

The regional sports networks that many believe are poised for bankruptcy? In the short term and long term, Silver said, “I’m not all that concerned.”

There was no big-picture problem that couldn’t be side-stepped as Silver addressed the media in his annual news conference ahead of All-Star Saturday night at Vivint Arena. Entering his 10th season as commissioner, Silver downplayed key issues facing the league, and even went back on some of his own stronger stances from the past.

Perhaps the most headline-grabbing issue of the last few weeks was the dissolution of the Brooklyn Nets, which saw Irving push for a trade after failing to come to terms on a contract extension (getting dealt to Dallas), then Durant maneuver his way to Phoenix behind the scenes after Irving left.

Silver has previously expressed disapproval of public trade demands by superstars under contract. But speaking with reporters on Saturday, Durant said he didn’t think those moves were bad for the league – the opposite, actually.

“It brings plenty more eyes to the league,” Durant said. “People are more excited. The tweets that we got, the news hits that we got from me being traded, Kyrie being traded – it just brings more attention to the league. And that’s really what makes you money is when you get more attention. So I think it’s great for the league to be honest.”

While Silver acknowledged that public trade demands are “corrosive” and “certainly fans don’t like it,” he didn’t contradict Durant – and even seemed to be in some agreement with him.

“You want to find the right balance,” Silver said. “You want, obviously, players to honor their contracts, and at the same time, a certain amount of player movement is good. So strongly against anything said publicly. I agree that a certain amount of player movement is good, but I think it has to be done in partnership and honoring those agreements that players and teams enter into.”

After four years and one playoff series win, Nets fans might feel slightly differently watching three stars – Durant, Irving and Harden – push their way out the door over the course of a calendar year.

It wasn’t the only issue where Silver seemed to soften on stances that players might take issue with. Amid discussion that end-of-season honors might be tied to the number of games played, he also suggested load management – and stars missing regular-season games for rest – isn’t as big a problem as many believe. Noting that the NBA is on track to set ticket sales records and season ticket renewal records, Silver said fans might not view it as an existential problem.

Still, he seemed to hit a wall when breaking the problem down at a fan level: “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.”

There doesn’t seem to be much of an appetite for the NBA to abandon the traditional 82-game schedule, and the league has tried to make the schedule more player-friendly by lowering back-to-back games and eliminating stretches of four games in five days.

“It’s something that I don’t think we’re approaching in an adversarial way with the players association,” Silver said. “We’re working collectively, together with our doctors, our data scientists and trying to see if there’s an optimal way for player performance. If it means at some point we conclude that we’re better off elongating the schedule … that’s worth looking at. If we thought it made sense to reduce the number of games we would.”

The issue where Silver showed the most urgency was the need for the league and the NBPA to come to terms on a new Collective Bargaining Agreement. The sides have until March 31 to decide if either wants to opt out of the current deal on June 30; that deadline has already been moved twice and can be again, if necessary. Said Silver: “it’s an absolute priority for us as well to get a deal done as soon as possible.”

Among the issues that the NBA and the NBPA have been discussing in recent weeks is a return to letting players enter the draft straight out of high school without waiting a year – that move is expected to be included in the next CBA – along with what the league considers an “upper spending limit” that would significantly tighten the rules on how much teams can spend each year on their roster.

“Yes, it has been considered,” NBPA Executive Director Tamika Tremaglio, speaking at a separate news conference before Silver’s, said of the spending limit. “And no, it is not acceptable.”

Silver was laissez-faire with other regional league stories. In Boston’s handling of its investigation and subsequent suspension (and earlier this week, dismissal) of former coach Ime Udoka, he said the Celtics handled it well. He said Madison Square Garden’s use of facial recognition software to exclude certain guests, which has come under significant fire and court action, was within bounds as long as “they comply with local law.” After Utah Gov. Spencer Cox suggested that the NBA tolerated the state’s anti-trans legislation because, “They’re trying to get a little bit more out of those culture wars,” Silver said of the NBA’s policy of looking at a state’s human rights issues: “I would just say we don’t have a general policy going into it.”

Perhaps the looming problem to most affect the NBA’s bottom line: Diamond Sports, which controls roughly half of the league’s regional sports distributors under the “Bally Sports” brand, missed a $140 million interest payment, signaling to many industry experts that they might declare bankruptcy. In that scenario, NBA teams would stop receiving revenue payments from Diamond Sports, and regionally televised games could go off the air in many of the NBA’s markets – including Clippers games in Los Angeles.

Silver said short-term problems aren’t concerning, namely because there isn’t much regular season left, between 23-25 games for most teams.

“If they were to indeed, you know, file for bankruptcy, there won’t be that much of the regular season left,” he said. “For that period of time, we will have in place arrangements, if necessary, to continue to distribute those games to fans. So I think that’s what’s most important.”

In the long-term, the league is looking at more streaming options anyway, Silver said. As Diamond Sports restructures, the NBA continues conversations on how to keep its games on the air, Silver said.

“I’m fairly optimistic we’ll be able to work something out with them,” he added.

Optimism abounds.

The Associated Press contributed to this story.