TIM FRANK: Thanks, everybody, for joining us for our annual start-of-season call here for the 2021-22 season. Joining us today is the commissioner of the NBA, Adam Silver, as well as our deputy commissioner, Mark Tatum.
We have our members of the NBA family on the call here from our staff to answer any questions that might come up, but primarily it'll be Adam and Mark. Adam?
ADAM SILVER: Thank you, Tim, and hello, everyone. That's not a virtual background. That's our offices looking south at Manhattan. Most of us are back in the office at work, and I appreciate all of you joining today's call.
As you all know, our 75th Anniversary Season starts tomorrow night with a doubleheader on TNT. It's our hope that this season will look a lot more like normal. As you know, we're playing our regular 82-game schedule, and we'll have full arenas in every team market for the first time in nearly two years.
Part of what we feel makes the NBA so special is the passion that the fans bring to our games, and we're of course thrilled to have them back. We've worked in partnership with our Players Association on a set of protocols that we feel confident will continue to protect the health and safety of everyone involved.
While a few players who elected not to get vaccinated have commanded enormous attention, roughly 96 percent of our players are vaccinated, and that number will likely tick up a bit, a little bit more, once the season starts.
In terms of our 75th anniversary, we look forward to celebrating the players and teams, both past and present, that have helped shape the league. We'll unveil our 75th Anniversary Team over the next three days on TNT and ESPN.
Many of you I know have created your own lists, and several of them I've been reading. There's no doubt that the various rankings will generate a season-long debate and conversation among fans and all of you.
Lastly, I'm really looking forward to getting back to the competition on the court. I don't remember a time when we had so much great talent spread around the league. Since 2010, eight different teams have won championships, so that's eight different teams over the last 11 seasons. Of course, we'll see what happens this year.
One last thing before I turn it back to Tim. Congratulations to the Chicago Sky on winning their first WNBA championship. Back to you, Tim, and I'm happy to answer any of your questions as well as my colleagues who are on this call.
Q. I have two things for you. First off, obviously every arena will be filled once you get going starting tomorrow night. The pandemic obviously is not over; how secure are you in the belief that the league has done everything it can to get the message to teams, players, fans, et cetera, the need for continued vigilance and all that to avoid interruptions and other problems? And as a completely separate question, I wanted to ask if there's any update on the status of the investigations into Miami and Chicago? Thank you.
ADAM SILVER: It's easier to deal with your second question first. The answer is no. Investigations are ongoing, and no update right now.
In terms of our arena protocols, we've learned a lot over the last two seasons. We were fortunate in that we had several full buildings in the Playoffs and Finals, as you know, last year, which seemed to come right before the worst onset of Delta, and now it seems like we're starting right when Delta is in a significant decline.
We've watched how other leagues have done things in the interim. We've learned a lot from the NFL, baseball, college football, in regular touch with all the administrators in those sports, and of course we've conferred with the NHL, as well. We feel as good as we can.
The one thing certainly I've learned over the last year and a half is to be very cautious about making any predictions, including what will happen with this virus. I think that the general public has been well educated at this point on what's required. We of course have variances from market to market, in certain cases from country to country, given we have a team in Canada. Different regions of the country have adopted different practices, and so going into the season we'll have some arenas that require everyone to be vaccinated and others where it's illegal to even ask. That's what we're dealing with in this country right now.
I think certainly fans understand the conditions they're entering. I saw it in the Playoffs last year. There's no doubt that people seem incredibly anxious to get back out, be in full arenas, just enjoy the excitement not just of the game but being around other people.
I think the fact that even though ultimately we could not agree with the Players Association on mandatory vaccinations for our players, I think the fact that, as I said, virtually all of our players have elected to get vaccinated I think means they understand the conditions under which they're playing. And for those who have decided not to get vaccinated -- put aside some of the local restrictions we're dealing with for example here in New York -- those players understand that they'll still be going through a rigorous set of daily testing and other requirements to ensure that they're safe and that they keep their teammates safe.
Overall, I feel very good about it. I have no doubt that just like when we proceeded into the bubble and throughout last season, there will be modifications that we'll be making once we start. Dave Weiss is on this call. He oversees the protocols for the league office. He's in daily conversation with teams and with the Players Association.
I'm sure once we begin, and aside from the little bit of learnings in the preseason, that we're seeing what it's like to operate in these protocols, and we see what's happening one way or the other with the virus, we'll be making some modifications. But I think we're in good shape right now.
Dave Weiss, anything you want to add?
DAVE WEISS: No, that was great. I agree with that all.
Q. I was just curious, do you believe that it's fair that Kyrie Irving is unable to play and will lose a good chunk of his salary because of the local vaccine mandates, whereas other players who have said they're unvaccinated, say Bradley Beal in Washington, can play in New York and everywhere else and have no repercussions because of it?
ADAM SILVER: You know, I'm not sure if fair is the right way to approach it because there's nothing fair about this virus. It's indiscriminate in terms of who it impacts, and I think it's perfectly appropriate that New York and other cities have passed laws that require people who both work and visit arenas to be vaccinated. That seems to be a responsible public health decision made by those locales, and those are the circumstances in which the Nets find themselves operating.
I accept that. I think that we understand as a league we have to play the cards that are dealt, just in the same way there are variations from market to market. I know there are players in some markets who would prefer that their local governments pass ordinances requiring that all the fans be vaccinated who are in the buildings with them.
We'll see how it plays out. I mean, frankly I hope that Kyrie sort of -- despite how strongly he feels about the vaccination, ultimately decides to get vaccinated because I'd love to see him play basketball this season, and I'd love to see the Brooklyn Nets have their full complement of players on the floor.
Q. You mentioned obviously the vaccination rate is at 96 percent. Are you disappointed that you were unable to come to an agreement with the Players Association on a mandate, and if you could shed any light on to why you think you were unable to come up with an agreement on that?
ADAM SILVER: Well, at the time we were discussing it with the Players Association, the percentage I believe of players vaccinated was in the low 80s. I'm not sure they could have predicted at that point precisely how many players would choose not to get vaccinated.
I won't try to speak for them, other than the view that some players had, I think including maybe some players who are vaccinated, that it should be individual choice among the players.
I would have preferred that ultimately that the Players Association agreed to mandatory vaccinations. The officials union agreed to mandatory vaccinations despite oppositions from some of their members.
But ultimately I think we could have avoided a lot of the adversarial nature of these issues for our players. It's not so much with the league; I think that gets confused in some cases. This is between Kyrie and New York City right now. This is not a league issue. As you've pointed out, it's not mandatory in the league.
But I think it would have been best for everyone if every player were vaccinated.
Q. Tim Reynolds asked you earlier about the ongoing investigation with the Bulls and the Pelicans. To take a step back, the league moved the starting time of free agency up to 6:00, basically so more people would be awake to be on Twitter and on TV and enjoy all the gossip and the news and that sort of thing.
You've had teams now, looks like they're getting in trouble the last two seasons basically from media reports, like reporting that complicated deals had been finalized, which basically proved tampering. Isn't that a little, I don't know if hypocritical is the right word, but isn't there a problem here if you're going to enforce this kind of tampering rule at the same time where you clearly want to enjoy the buzz and the hype of these kind of deals being reported and coming to fruition as quickly as they do?
ADAM SILVER: The genesis of the change in time was more a function of our teams saying that there was unfairness depending on what time zone you were based in that required team executives, in some cases players, to pull all-nighters in certain cases, asking people to show up at midnight or whatever else and begin meetings.
Well, sure, we enjoy the coverage around free agency. It's going to come regardless of sort of the timing and where players choose to go. From a league standpoint, we're just trying to create a level playing field. We tried to reset two years ago and make that absolutely clear to our teams, that going forward, to the extent we could, we would be strictly enforcing these rules, and that's what we're dealing with right now.
You know, our teams want us to enforce these rules because our teams want to know that if they follow them, they're not going to be at a competitive disadvantage to other teams in the league. So first and foremost, these changes were generated for the convenience of our teams and players, not designed around media coverage.
Q. Just to follow up then, not that either of us are reinventing the wheel here, it's not a new discussion, I suppose, but if players can talk to players while they're under contract, about asking for a trade or forcing a trade to another team, why is it such a problem for agents to have similar conversations with team executives?
ADAM SILVER: I think for two reasons. One, players can't trade themselves. That's a management prerogative. Number two, there's just the practical aspect, at least the way we've looked at it historically, this notion that we could somehow regulate conversations players are having with each other.
It just made no sense to us. We were just trying to be practical. It doesn't mean that we're not open to new ideas to better create a level playing field here and ensure that the competition is fair. That's ultimately what this is about. Technology changes, practices change around the league, and we have to keep up with that. So it's something we'll continue to look at.
Q. Back to the players who are not vaccinated, I was wondering if you or anyone from your office has talked to Kyrie Irving directly and if there's anything you plan on doing or continuing to do in terms of outreach to maybe convince him or any other player who hasn't gotten the vaccine to get the vaccine? And then adjacent to that, is there any indication that your office is hearing that New York would relax its vaccine mandate at any point during the course of the season so that Kyrie Irving could play?
ADAM SILVER: On the second part of your question, of course I live here in the New York market and follow the local news. There's no suggestions that I've read or heard that New York is considering changing its law. We have a mayoral election coming up here, and I haven't heard the candidates reference any proposed change in the rules.
In terms of outreach to Kyrie, I don't think it's appropriate to reference individual conversations. Kyrie and I know each other well. We both attended Duke University. I know he has strong views on lots of topics.
I would say as a general matter, there's been a lot of educational outreach both by the league and the Players Association really since the vaccines first came out. It's been part of group discussions, Zoom calls, individual meetings. There have been several well-known doctors and scientists who have had direct conversations with our players, others who reached out to the league and the Players Association and offered their services, because I think there is the acknowledgment that the position a player takes can have outsized influence on the rest of the public. It's one reason why I would like to see all our players vaccinated, because I think it's a public service of sorts, particularly to young people who might not see the value of getting vaccinated.
That outreach will continue. We think that at the end of the day that players being fully informed is helpful here, certainly that the science very much supports getting vaccinated, again, not just for themselves but for their families and their communities. As I said earlier, I'm still hopeful that Kyrie will decide to get vaccinated.
Just to my colleague Kathy Behrens, because she's overseeing these educational efforts with our teams, anything you want to add?
KATHY BEHRENS: I think you've covered it. I would just say that we and the Players Association have made lots of experts available to our teams and our players individually to speak with anyone they want to to answer more questions, provide additional information. And that's going to be an ongoing process.
Q. There were rumors about the NBA introducing a midseason tournament. Considering that the WNBA tried that in its season, I was wondering what do you think about the Commissioner's Cup in the WNBA and what about the talks of a midseason tournament for the NBA?
ADAM SILVER: So I thought the Commissioner's Cup in the WNBA was a great start. As I've said before, I'm a fan of creating some other forms of competition throughout the season. In the NBA, we've moved from a midseason concept; I'll call it an in-season tournament right now because I'm not sure precisely where it would fall, and those conversations have been ongoing in order to create new competition. Not only would we have to convince the 30 teams that it made sense, but of course the players and their union, as well.
We're in the process still of formulating what we think would be the best proposal for all concerned. I will say I've learned a lot from European soccer. I think we could play other competitions throughout the season without taking anything away from the Larry O'Brien Trophy.
Certainly that will continue to be the premier cup under any circumstances in this league, but the world is changing and viewership habits are changing. People have so many different choices to watch sports competition at any time from around the world, so many different forms of entertainment. I personally think another form of competition would make sense.
But we have a fair amount of work still to do on it and a lot of convincing to do. I know that for some of the players I've talked to directly, they have trouble, I think, envisioning the benefit of another form of competition when they're so focused on the Larry O'Brien Trophy and don't necessarily see us being able to create a new tradition. My response to that, especially having been with the league now for so long, is that these things take time. I think we're in a position where we should be taking a long-term view looking at those changes in society around us and looking at -- and it's a responsibility of the league office to look out into the future on these things.
Evan Wasch is on the call, who is most directly responsible for looking at these different models, and Byron Spruell, who runs basketball operations. Just wondering if you guys want to add anything.
EVAN WASCH: The only thing I would add, in addition to the WNBA, the G League this season will be launching a Showcase Cup, where the first portion of their season will be used as a qualification into a cup to be played during the G League Showcase. We're lucky to have a partnership with the WNBA, the ability to use the G League as a testing lab of sorts for these sorts of concepts.
I think one thing we're learning is that you can do an in-season tournament without it being materially disruptive to the season, as the W did. Now, they launched it in a year, of course, with the Olympics, so they already had a break built in. But both the W and G League versions don't have that same level of disruption, which was a concern of a lot of our teams through this process.
As Adam said, a lot of discussions to have and input together, but we also are able to use some of our partner leagues and properties and see how those play out.
Q. You mentioned $10 billion revenue is what you guys are predicting this season. Is that based off of attendance returning fully? Also, I know it's not back on state-run TV in China, but are you anticipating that that's going to change throughout this year?
ADAM SILVER: Yes. The $10 billion revenue projection is based on full arenas this season. And it's unclear whether we'll be back on CCTV television in China this year. Our projections are not dependent on it. I will say we've been back on Tencent, the streaming service in China, for some time now, and will be when the season starts tomorrow night.
Q. How do you feel the league got through the two COVID seasons? And while you're talking about a recouping of operational revenue this year, how much were the operational losses over the last two seasons?
ADAM SILVER: I'd just say hats off to my colleagues and the players and their representatives for working so closely together in both creating and operating through a bubble and then through some difficult circumstances last season. It took enormous sacrifice.
I always say this in the context of greater society, where people were making sacrifices far greater than our players and our teams, but it wasn't easy for anyone. I think it was talked about before. I think the mental health issues were profound in some cases, the enormous amount of isolation. I think sleep deprivation and the daily testing sometimes very early in the morning after late flights.
But I think everyone understood that extraordinary times required extraordinary measures in order to continue to play this game that they all love and keep our business going and provide thousands of people with jobs.
I think we won't know until we can look back when this pandemic is truly over how we can grade ourselves relative to how other businesses have done. I'll just say that I'm really thrilled that we're back to something that looks closer to normal this year.
I won't get into specific numbers in terms of operating losses. Even the number Jabari asked me about for this season, that's a top-line revenue number. It doesn't go to profitability. But it's clear given how significantly down our revenues were the last two years -- I think I said going into last season we were looking at being down something like 40 percent, because we ended up having fans in some of our buildings in the Playoffs. The final number, I don't have it right here, but it's probably closer to 35 percent down in revenue.
As a result, we lost significant amounts of money. The good news I think is that we're able to take a long-term view of this business and continue to grow in it, continue to invest in it. So we'll try to look at it as an ongoing investment in the business over a long period of time as opposed to a loss of an individual season.
Q. Springing from that back to the question of expansion, where does that stand at this point? And with the new revamped KeyArena, Climate Pledge Arena opening for hockey this week in Seattle, does that put them in any sort of position for an expansion team? I know a lot of people up in the Northwest are talking about that.
ADAM SILVER: I haven't seen that new arena yet. I've certainly heard great things about it. We've followed its development.
Nothing new, though, to report on expansion. As I've said before, we want to be fully through the pandemic and know that we're back operating on all cylinders before we seriously start to look out into the future.
We will. I mean, I don't think there's any doubt that at some point we'll take a very serious look at potential expansion, and as I've said before, Seattle is one of those cities that we have our eye on. We had great success there in the past, and the fact now that they have a state-of-the-art arena back online only increases their prospects. But it's premature to get more specific than that.
Q. In two weeks the NFL will announce who won the HMA auction, which allows individual teams to market themselves outside of the country, particularly internationally. I know the NBA is taking some steps in that direction, allowing teams to do that. What is the potential in general? What are some of the obstacles to that? And what would be the timeline of the NBA moving in that direction?
ADAM SILVER: The potential is enormous. I mean, we have an opportunity that's essentially the entire world to market basketball and NBA-branded basketball. We're likely the No. 2 global sport after soccer/football, and what has dramatically changed over the last decade is that handheld technology and tablets that enable us to reach every corner of the planet with high-quality NBA streaming.
On top of that, the number of international players represented in our league only continues to grow. Roughly 25 percent now of our players were born outside of the United States, and as you know, increasingly some of our biggest stars are coming from outside of the United States.
Then the question becomes what's the optimal way to structure the team-league relationship in how we do our marketing. We've made some changes in the model, I would say, particularly over the last five years, where we've given our teams more opportunities to market themselves outside of the U.S.
I mean, the patch on the jersey, of course, is one of those examples, and there's other things that the teams can now do using digital media.
I'll say, when you step back, the model which we operate under now was essentially based on broadcast television when it formed, essentially how far a team's signal would reach. Obviously, that's somewhat irrelevant in this day and age.
So it's something that we're spending a lot of time studying. On one hand, I don't think we should move to a model where it's a free-for-all in every market because, just by way of example, every team is playing another team, and you wouldn't want both teams selling that same broadcast. That obviously wouldn't make sense.
But having said that, we'd also like to create incentives for teams to want to drive their fan base and their club far outside of their market. I think that we understand at the league office that with 30 top-notch marketing organizations, it doesn't make sense at all to limit sort of that innovation and that entrepreneurial vibrancy to just their market.
We're going to continue to look at it, but where we're going to end up at some point is the ability to have that direct-to-consumer relationship regardless of where that fan is. That seems fairly clear to me. Given that people are living on their phones, they should at any point when a game is on be able to get that game directly to them. Whether that's served by the team or by the league is yet to be decided, but we'll work through those issues.
Q. This will be the third year in a row that the majority of Nuggets fans in Denver won't be able to watch the games because of the ongoing RSN dispute between Altitude and Comcast. What is the league doing to address this? And B, are there any alternative streaming options that might be on the horizon?
ADAM SILVER: Yep, it's extremely frustrating that those games are not available. What we're doing -- in addition to working with the Nuggets on alternative streaming options, partly is the response to the last question. We're very focused on reshaping the model in terms of the way our games are distributed now so that even if games are on cable or satellite in a local market, that fans who don't choose to subscribe to a larger bundle aren't disenfranchised from the league.
And the numbers are particularly dramatic for our younger fans, who generally either are not subscribing to cable or satellite, or to the extent they are, are largely using it to watch other platforms, using it as a broadband provider.
You know, it's a really tough period right now because this industry is going through a transition. There's no question about it. I think that we have to be mindful of not taking our fans for granted, and that at some point if our product becomes unavailable to them, they're going to look for alternative ways to entertain themselves.
I wish I had a better answer that there was some short-term fix, but it's -- I think that in some ways, Denver has been the canary in the mine, because you're seeing now that this issue is popping up in other markets in the country. Maybe not in such an extreme way, but you have other teams that are still continuing to be distributed through traditional means but large segments of their fans aren't able to get the games. Coming up with that in-market solution is at the top of our agenda right now.
Q. I'm wondering your thoughts on several of your players who in responding to media questions have talked about their individual choices regarding the vaccine or even some of your players who have talked about their peers' individual choices? Are you concerned for them when they sort of end up in the crosshairs of social media and taking a lot of criticism for that in contrast to what the league's preferences are?
ADAM SILVER: I'm not sure how to answer that question. I am concerned generally about the hostility on social media. It's a difficult place to live for anyone who is in public life, whether it be athletes or politicians or elected officials, and it has a particularly deleterious impact on young people. It seems the data is pretty clear on that.
I've been following some of the recent Congressional hearings, and I think it's an area that cries out for some additional regulation. At least that's my personal view.
I think in terms of players expressing their opinions and their individual choices, I always encourage that. It doesn't necessarily mean that because a player has a particular opinion it then becomes their right -- and I think that gets lost sometimes, that having an opinion about whether to get vaccinated is different than your right to play NBA basketball. We're seeing that, for example, in the New York market right now, when there's a conflict with a player's point of view and the local law, and the local law is going to trump that player's point of view.
I've always tried to ensure that players feel comfortable using this platform that the league affords them. I don't mean literally the league. Just by being a famous NBA player, that they use it responsibly, that they educate themselves on points of view, but they also are respected in return.
I think all the folks on this call know that there are also situations where I think players have expressed political points of view that are completely legitimate in our society, and there have been some segments of society that have suggested they'd like to cancel them as a result. Neither the left nor the right seems to have a monopoly on threats of canceling people. It's disheartening in that at least historically sports was a convener of communities that presumably enabled people to come together in a respected environment and to share those points of view.
I hope that to the extent that players continue to express points of view on a variety of topics that those points of view are respected. Again, that doesn't mean that either the league will necessarily agree with them or fans will, but that fans will respect them for doing that, as long as it doesn't cross certain lines of vulgarity or hate speech, et cetera. There's obviously some other categories where people shouldn't go as representatives of this league.
But otherwise anything that the league can do -- something we think about a lot, to create more of a constructive environment for people to talk. It's something that we want to continue to try to do.
Q. I don't know any of the details yet, and we've got four months of unknowns, but how confident are you that the All-Star Game come February will be able to sort of be enjoyed for what this 75th Anniversary Season intends to celebrate?
ADAM SILVER: Yeah, I feel pretty confident about it. It goes to sort of what I said at the beginning of the call. I do want to always be cautious in dealing with a virus like this. We never had predicted at this time last year that that next wave would hit the country as hard as it did when we went into January and February and last season. But at least based on the projections we're looking at, the modeling from our experts, we expect Cleveland to be a great experience.
Mark Tatum, he oversees the operations there. Anything you want to add?
MARK TATUM: Thanks, Adam. We have our team of people on the ground this week. They've been there regularly in contact with the team there, in contact with all of the different hotel properties and the restaurants. As Adam said, their hope and our expectation is that they'll be able to put on a very, very successful All-Star Game and create an experience for all of our fans and our guests that are there.
As Adam said, it's also very unpredictable, but right now things seem to be on track.
Q. The league, the players, and even ownership got heavily involved in the political arena as far as the support behind the George Floyd Bill. It stalled in Congress a few weeks ago, which I guess came across as a surprise to a lot of people. Were you surprised? Have you talked to any players since then? What was your initial and prevailing thought process since then?
ADAM SILVER: Yeah, as you know, coming out of the bubble, we created our Social Justice Foundation, hired a guy named James Cadogan, who has been leading our efforts there. I have talked directly to several players about it because we have a board that's made up of team owners and players and union officials just to focus on these matters.
I guess I'd say I'm not surprised that it stalled in Congress just because from a distance, watching on all areas in the public discourse in Washington, it's gotten so heated. There's so little consensus. It's been so politicized. I think even on issues like criminal justice where there seems to be a bipartisan consensus that there are areas where we can work together, it just seems incredibly difficult to make progress.
So I'm far from expert on the legislative process, but just as an observer I can't say I'm really surprised that the bill hasn't moved through.
Q. I'm just wondering, now that things have kind of stabilized-ish in North America regarding the pandemic, where is NBA Africa, and how much did what we've dealt with the last 18 or 20 months, how much did it sort of hold back NBA Africa, and how soon can it maybe get to where you were hoping it might be?
ADAM SILVER: We made a lot of progress during the pandemic. As you know, we ended up creating our own bubble in Rwanda and launching our league. It was delayed, but we got the first season off the ground in a tournament format. The virus continues to plague Africa. They're dealing with the opposite issue of the U.S. and Canada, that -- well, I won't throw Canada in with the U.S.
I mean, the good news, sometimes we talk so much about the unvaccinated, it's forgotten that something like 79 percent of Americans have gotten at least one shot so far. But in Africa, they're begging for the vaccines and they're not generally available on a mass scale yet to the people there. That's something that we as a league, both in terms of the NBA and NBA Africa, have become very focused on, is trying to help the communities we're operating in.
But we got the first season off the ground. We're already making plans for the next season. Things are moving along comfortably there. I think, going into the season, we're looking at somewhere around 10 percent of our players who are either born in Africa or one of their parents was born in Africa. The interest continues to be huge on the continent.
You know, I'm not as optimistic as I am in the U.S. and certainly in Canada that they're going to be able to move through COVID as quickly as it looks like we're going to be able to here. But at some point we'll be able to fully focus sort of on continuing the business there.
Mark, anything you want to add?
MARK TATUM: No, Adam, you're absolutely right about the BAL launching. Although it launched a little bit more than 13 months later, it reached a billion people around the world. It was broadcast in 215 different countries and territories around the world. We're fast away planning for season 2, and we are looking to expand it across the continent there outside of just Kigali.
But those plans are coming along. We're looking to expand the footprint there in terms of offices that we have throughout the continent and continue to invest in the basketball ecosystem there.
The team is moving forward in all the different areas that we had planned to do despite the setback of COVID for the last year and a half.
TIM FRANK: Thanks, Mark, and of course thanks, Adam. That's it for today.
FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports