Life Inside the N.B.A. Bubble
By Marc Stein
Life Inside the N.B.A. Bubble
Life Inside the N.B.A. Bubble
I’ve covered the N.B.A. for nearly 30 years, but life inside the league’s “bubble” introduces all-new sights and sounds on a near-daily basis. Allow me to share a few snapshots — things you would only see on this tightly-controlled campus →
Life Inside the N.B.A. Bubble
Everyone in the bubble is asked to wear a proximity sensor to promote social distancing. A chirping alarm sounds if two people wearing sensors are within six feet each of other for 10 seconds — provided both are actually wearing them and have charged them overnight.
Life Inside the N.B.A. Bubble
Sensors are optional for players, many of whom privately scoff at the idea of wearing a device that is not a movement tracker but is widely described that way. Everyone else, including reporters, is required to wear them. That leads to lots of chirping on bus rides and in postgame media scrums when maintaining six feet of distance is nearly impossible.
Life Inside the N.B.A. Bubble
Speaking of buses, the small group of reporters here ride them daily to the three game venues at ESPN’s Wide World of Sports complex. This message, taped to the door or window on all buses, refers to the driver.
Life Inside the N.B.A. Bubble
Every day in the bubble starts the same for reporters. We record our temperature and oxygen saturation readings via a league-sanctioned app to receive access at checkpoints within the bubble.
Then we head to the testing room, with access set aside exclusively for reporters in the 9 a.m. hour, to receive three shallow throat swabs and one shallow swab of each nostril — daily.
Life Inside the N.B.A. Bubble
The traditional N.B.A. bench is gone. To keep the area as safe as possible, there are three rows of socially-distanced chairs. Players are assigned seats furnished with an individual Gatorade station to ensure no sharing of drinks.
Life Inside the N.B.A. Bubble
San Antonio’s Gregg Popovich, at 71, is the oldest coach in the N.B.A. He is among the few coaches who wears a mask while coaching games, despite the impediment to voice projection. When asked why he stays faithful to the mask, Popovich replied: “I don’t want to die.”
Life Inside the N.B.A. Bubble
Coaches such as Popovich and Houston’s Mike D’Antoni have expressed surprise about the quality of play after the long layoff. There is cautious optimism that the bubble can hold through October to allow the N.B.A. to produce a legitimate conclusion to the 2019-20 season.
Life Inside the N.B.A. Bubble
Of course, there is no guarantee that the N.B.A. can continue to keep the coronavirus from infiltrating this first-of-a-kind village that houses 22 teams.
But it already seems clear that the bubble approach was the only approach that had any shot in 2020, especially given the challenges Major League Baseball has already faced in its comeback.
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