October 13th 2023.
Former Detroit Pistons guard Joe Dumars, now a top NBA official, said Wednesday that the practice of resting players for games throughout the 82-game regular season to prevent injury, known as "load management," is no longer supported by scientific data.
The Athletic reported that Dumars added that NBA players need to "reestablish" a culture of players attempting to play in most of the games during a season. According to him, data used to show that resting players was justified, but more recent data has proven that it doesn't correlate with lack of injuries or fatigue.
Dumars also reiterated his stance that "every player" should want to play 82 games. He said that while it is not likely that every player will be able to do so, the culture should strive for it.
This practice of load management became popular in 2018-2019 when Toronto Raptors forward Kawhi Leonard managed a leg injury by missing 22 games and not playing in any back-to-back games. Despite this, he led the Raptors to their first and only NBA championship and was named Finals MVP.
Unfortunately, this practice has spread throughout the league since then, with numerous stars being held out of games even if they weren't injured. This has caused a lot of upset, especially from the NBA's TV partners, since these absences often occurred during Thursday and Friday nights when the games were broadcasted nationally on TNT and ESPN.
To combat this, the NBA and the NBA Players Association recently established a player participation policy that will go into effect beginning this season. Under the policy, no more than one star player can be unavailable for more than one game unless they are determined to be injured. Teams must ensure that star players are available for nationally televised and in-season tournament games, with a preference for the player to miss home games. Star players who are out due to load management must be present and on the bench.
The policy also defines what a "star player" is, which is someone who has been named to an All-Star team or All-NBA team within the last three years. The NBA has also exempted any player who has more than 34,000 career minutes in the NBA or has played a combined 1,000 career regular season and playoff games from the rules.
Hopefully, this new policy will help to restore the culture of striving to play in most of the games during a season, as Joe Dumars has proposed.
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