How quickly will players knock off rust? To what degree will players be more susceptible to injuries? And will the long hiatus even the playing field between playoff teams? “I don’t think anyone in the NBA has ever been through anything like this,” Weltman said. “These guys have never been through this long a period of not playing basketball. And so that’s where the attachment (between players and their teams), the communication, the organization … will matter. The conditioning and the work that players have put in individually will matter. But this is completely unpredictable.”