Mark Cuban 'all for' idea to finish NBA season at quarantined site: 'America needs sports'
Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban is no longer discussing the timetable for the NBA to return from its coronavirus hiatus, but he is a fan of playing out the season at a single isolated site.
Cuban: Quarantined site to continue NBA ‘sounds great’
A group of league executives are reportedly considering playing a final set of regular season games at one or two empty arenas in a month. It would be a quarantined community to keep fans and players safe.
"It sounds great to me, and I'll tell you why: America needs sports," Cuban said on ESPN’s Get Up. "We need something to root for; we need something to be excited about. Everybody in North Texas wants a reason to have the Mavs back on, and to get excited and to cheer together — even if there's not any fans, just being able to watch on television and get excited and yell at the TV and high-five people again. We just need that. And so I'm all for it. Whatever we can make happen, I'm pro-doing it."
The federal government extended social distancing guidelines to April 30, days before the conference semifinals were initially scheduled to begin. The Chinese Basketball Association delayed its season restart again this week, causing concern for U.S. sports leagues.
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Rivers says Las Vegas would be spot
Houston Rockets guard Austin Rivers said in an Instagram Live on Wednesday that one of the locations being discussed is Las Vegas. The teams would get two practices before starting up the season, he said per Justin Russo.
On his IG live just now, Austin Rivers said teams would get two practices before starting up the season again and all the games would be in Las Vegas, apparently. That's one of the propositions.
— Justin Russo (@FlyByKnite) April 1, 2020
Rivers, the son of Las Angeles Clippers coach Doc Rivers, said the NBA is looking at gyms in the Vegas area but are talking about holding the games at the Thomas & Mack Center at the University of Nevada campus. The first two rounds of the playoffs are being discussed as best-of-three rather than seven, he said.
When will the NBA be back?
In the immediate days after the NBA suspended its season, Cuban said the league isn’t ruling out pushing the season conclusion and playoffs into July and possibly August. Last week, he expressed optimism the league would re-start in mid-May, the approximate 60-day mark he had projected initially.
In his conversation on "Get Up," he stepped back and said he has “no idea,” only that the league will put “safety first and we’re not going to take any chances.”
“So right now, I really don’t have anything new to say,” he said, per ESPN.
Is President Cuban in the cards?
The entrepreneur has been applauded for his reaction and efforts for America’s workers during a pandemic that is impacting the economy.
He wouldn’t say if he would run for president, but does see it as a way to get new leadership “whether it’s me or anybody else.” Via Yahoo Finance:
“Everything’s changed,” he said. “So, I’m not going to answer the question. I don’t have an answer.”
“This is American reset 1.0. We get the chance to rewrite all the rules and do it in a way that is non-partisan, puts people first, puts everybody on equal footing, and says, ‘You know what, let’s go forward and do this together. We the people,’” Cuban said.
Cuban railed at Congress when it couldn’t get a stimulus package through on the first try that would help support those impacted by the shutdowns due to the pandemic.
Cuban’s work for hourly employees, local business
The NBA announced it would go on hiatus while the Mavericks were playing on ESPN and Cuban’s reaction was caught on camera. In an ensuing interview, and again in a post-game news conference, he noted without prompting the hourly workers in America were going to be hit hardest.
He pledged full support for them and followed it up 12 hours later with the news he pay the arena employees what they would have made. He is also setting up jobs and reimbursing employees who eat at locally owned independent restaurants.
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