NBA San Antonio Spurs

San Antonio Spurs Continue To Illustrate The Need For A Shorter NBA Season

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By @MattSamFolk

Gregg Popovich

Soobum Im-USA TODAY Sports

On Thursday, Gregg Popovich will give both the NBA and its fans his yearly reminder that the season is too long and too grueling.

The NBA season hasn’t officially started until Pop rests star players for a nationally-televised game, which will happen tonight when Tim Duncan and Manu Ginobili grab some bench as the San Antonio Spurs take on the Houston Rockets. Although the Spurs are playing the second half of a back-to-back, it is a little surprising that Popovich is sitting two stars when his team is already dealing with a few minor injuries and had four days off prior to their game against the Atlanta Hawks.

The Spurs have made resting key players commonplace in recent years, often getting fined by the NBA for not playing marquee players, especially in nationally-televised games. The strategy was born of necessity when injuries hurt San Antonio down the stretch several times during the Spurs’ NBA Finals drought between 2007 and 2013.

Now Popovich has taken it to even more of an extreme, managing not only games played, but also keeping every player on his team under 30 minutes per game a season ago, showcasing his team’s unparalleled depth.

It’s time for the league to step in on the daunting length of an NBA season. NBA players’ travel schedules are the most difficult of any sport, and brutal back-to-backs and sets of four games in five nights are incredibly taxing on players’ bodies. Players don’t get enough sleep or rest, negatively affecting their performance and the product on the court. Teams that play deep into the playoffs in consecutive years face an absurd amount of physical exertion, increasing injury risks.

In addition, regular season games would be more valuable with a shorter slate. Most teams know who they are by the All-Star break and fall into three camps: contenders hoping to round into form and stay healthy, teams scrapping for a playoff spot, and weary lottery teams ready for the offseason. A shorter season would help everybody, simultaneously increasing the variability and excitement of the season for fans.

The NBA experimented with a shorter game in the preseason, a change that would have far more unseen consequences for the games themselves and wouldn’t fix the travel and sleep concerns.

It seems like a no-brainer, and with the influx of money coming to the league in its new TV deal with ESPN and TNT, they may be able to absorb much of the lost revenue if the league were to time a change properly. NBA commissioner Adam Silver has stayed mostly quiet on the issue, reluctantly standing by the status quo, but he should be implored to explore a shorter season.

While 60 or 66 games would be interesting benchmarks, the most likely change would be to 72 games. With some creative scheduling and perhaps adding a week or so to the regular season, the NBA could eliminate back-to-backs and the dreaded four-in-fives. For now, the Spurs will continue benefiting from their built-in advantages – an excellent front office, a deep roster, and a Hall of Fame coach – as other teams wear down their stars during the regular season.

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