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Given the circumstances of the coronavirus pandemic, sporting entities around the globe have turned to the virtual world in order to stay connected with each other.
Practice facilities across all leagues have been shut down to prevent social interaction to help limit the spread of the virus. As a result, teams are holding video conference calls for meetings, workouts and training sessions to stay in communication.
Although live sports have been put on hold, leagues have still moved forward with key offseason events, such as the WNBA Draft that took place last Friday. It became the first virtual draft in history and it went down as a huge success.
The 2020 WNBA Draft was the second most-watched in league history and the most-watched since 2004. ESPN saw a 123% increase in viewership compared to last year and averaged 387,000 viewers throughout the evening.
On Thursday, the NFL will take its turn hosting its draft, an event that is projected to shatter viewership records.
Like the WNBA Draft, fans will tune in to ESPN to see which player their favorite NFL team selects but many will be curious to see how things operate in the virtual world. With over 100 camera feeds to manage, something almost assuredly will go wrong.
With the WNBA and NFL leading the way, essentially serving as the guinea pigs, the NBA will certainly be paying close attention to how things are managed should they decide to follow suit and hold their own draft virtually.
Of course, that decision has yet to be made as the 2020 NBA Draft is still scheduled to take place on June 25. The league is uncertain when and if the season will return to play, and with the schedule in limbo, the draft itself has taken a backseat.
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Teams are currently prohibited from working out prospects and viewing live video from prospects and were only recently approved to hold virtual meetings with players. As a result, the NBA has been pressured to move the draft back until at least August to give teams enough time to properly scout and prepare.
NBA commissioner Adam Silver has said that all options are on the table when it comes to returning to play and that same logic can be applied to the draft. If the league does move the draft back to at least August, the state of the country could be drastically changed then from present-day making it uncertain if the draft will take place in person or in the virtual world.
With much to be decided in the coming weeks, the status of several events on the NBA calendar is still up in the air but one thing is certain: The NBA will be watching on Thursday night.
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