The coronavirus pandemic has upended our world so much that nothing is set in stone anymore. Previously, Dallas Maverick owner Mark Cuban was hoping for a possible May return of the currently suspended NBA season, but he likes the idea of the season returning just in time for Christmas, according to CBS Sports.
A typical NBA season usually starts in the fall, sometime in October or November, and continues until late spring or early summer, stretching from April in the league’s earlier days into as late as June now. This week, during an appearance on ESPN’s
Get Up, the Shark Tank host stated he would prefer that the NBA season starts around Christmas and that now may be the perfect opportunity to alter the schedule to do so.“Honestly, it’s been something that I’ve been asking for more than 10 years. I’ve always thought that we should start on Christmas and go into the summer, but the response has always been that our television partners don’t want that because there are fewer households using television during the summer months. But everything is different right now. Particularly if we continue to be quarantined, then people are at home willing to watch the games. Nothing else is on other than SharkTank and SportsCenter and you guys, of course. But I think it really could be a great experiment for us, and if it works out well, then we could do it,” says Cuban.
Since the season is on lockdown, Cuban also said he doesn’t know when the season would pick back up.
“I have no idea. The only thing I know is that we’re putting safety first and that we’re not gonna take any chances, we’re not gonna do anything that risks the health or safety of our players, our fans, our staff, our whole organizations, so right now, I really don’t have anything new to say.”
“All the experts have got to say, ‘it’ll be absolutely safe.’ We cannot put anything ahead of the health and safety of our players and staff, that’s it, and it’s such a moving target, and nobody really has specifics. I haven’t had any conversations where anybody’s even discussed an actual date at this point.”