If this ends up working out, Yahoo Sports’ Keith Smith ought to get some kind of hardware from NBA Commissioner Adam Silver.
Smith was, of course, the first to suggest resuming the currently-suspended 2019-20 NBA season at Orlando, Florida’s Walt Disney World Resort due to the numerous advantages it has over competing locations in terms of comfort, safety and ease of adaptation.
It is now being reported that location is “the clear frontrunner” to become a single-site location to finish out the remainder of the pandemic-suspended season reports The Athletic’s Shams Charania and Sam Amick.
While any timetable for such a return is still nebulous at best, but “players fully training in mid-June and playing by mid-July has been the most popular and possible scenario,” according to the two authors.
Multiple-city scenarios were also on the table, and Houston as another single-site option were evidently also under consideration, but as of now, the primary remaining obstacles for a Disney finish are “final details regarding testing and hotel use.”
Disney’s employee union will also need to be on board with whatever plans are made as being safe enough for its members to work with, and the local conditions concerning COVID-19 will also need to be permitting.
So far, while Florida has been among the harder-hit parts of the U.S. in the pandemic, the Orlando area has been much safer than the state as a whole.
