The Boston Celtics are slowly coming to terms with how the COVID-19 coronavirus outbreak may impact their lives, but like the rest of us, they aren’t too excited about the prospects.
The NBA recently sent out an ominous-sounding memo advising teams to prepare for games in empty arenas with only minimal, essential staff should such an outcome be required, and the reaction both around the league and on the Celtics has been something mixed with trepidation and distaste.
Given that basketball is a spectator sport and the NBA a league fueled by the egos of stars who have spent their entire careers producing a spectacle carefully produced for a mass entertainment product, it’s understandable that some players would be reticent to play for an invisible audience.
Sources: The NBA has sent a memo to its franchises explaining that, due to coronavirus outbreak, teams should be preparing to play games without fans in attendance and identifying “essential staff” present for these games — should it be necessary.
— Shams Charania (@ShamsCharania) March 7, 2020
Around the league, players are already fist-bumping instead of handshaking out of viral transmission concerns, avoiding signing autographs, and spreading the gospel of hand-washing.
“Make sure y’all washing y’all hands with soap for 20 or more seconds & covering ya mouths when you cough. I am officially taking a break from signing autographs until further notice,” tweeted Portland Trail Blazer C. J. McCollum earlier in the week.
Boston’s Kemba Walker agreed.
“I might be with him. I don’t know,” noted the UConn product, per MassLive’s John Karalis. “It’s getting serious, I’ll tell you that much. Everyone just needs to be a little cautious about that virus. About everything. I’m pretty sure I’m still gonna sign some autographs for folks.”
“Maybe I should walk around with my own marker or something,” he added.
The Bronx native was much less enthusiastic about the prospect of playing for empty arenas, though. “That would be terrible,” said Walker via MassLive’s Tom Westerholm. “They might as well cancel the whole game before that. That would suck.”
Los Angeles Laker luminary LeBron James went as far as to say he’d sit out if there were no fans in the arena.
Kemba Walker on playing in an empty gym because of the coronavirus: "That would be terrible. … They might as well cancel the whole game before that. That would suck."
— Tom Westerholm (@Tom_NBA) March 7, 2020
Boston briefed their players with a visit from a doctor earlier in the week, which head coach Brad Stevens related a bit of how the team will treat the disease should someone come down with it.
“We’re treating it from our standpoint a lot like we would if a player got the flu, if somebody were to come down with it,” said the Celtics coach. “He gave all the facts and all the data and the stats and how we treat it, how to avoid it and all that stuff.”
The NBA is even considering restricting media access to players if need be.
Instead of allowing open access to the locker room and other team spaces, the media would be restricted to a press-conference-like scrum for all communication with the players to minimize the risk of virus transmission, according to The Athletic’s Shams Charania.
Knicks had their doctor address the team. Jazz gave out hand sanitizer. NBA players are using fist bumps. Some are fatalistic.
"It’s actually kinda good. A lot of people who don’t wash their hands after the bathroom are actually washing their hands now"https://t.co/1LhWuGyKbC— Mike Vorkunov (@MikeVorkunov) March 7, 2020
The spreading epidemic is already beginning to change the way fans live and work, and the Boston Celtics are not immune in any sense of the word more than the rest of us.
That the league is taking concrete, evidence-based steps to protect players and fans is not only laudable, but necessary — even if it transforms or even disrupts our favorite pastime.
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