The NBA and NBPA have reportedly finalized an agreement for the restarted season that will see 22 teams head to Orlando in July, with both sides agreeing, mostly, to the terms and policies laid out in the handbook sent to players last week.
However, according to ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski, there are a few additional items or tweaks that have been made to the final agreement. One of the most important of those is an “enhanced insurance policy” that the NBA and NBPA will take out to cover players that go into the bubble to provide extra protection in case of a career-ending injury suffered during the restart or if a player contracts COVID-19 and has long-term effects that ends their career.
NBA and NBPA have agreed to put into place an enhanced insurance plan for players in Orlando that would cover career-ending injuries related to Covid-19 or conventional basketball injuries, sources tell ESPN. Potential group policy would cover players for several million dollars.
— Adrian Wojnarowski (@wojespn) June 23, 2020
It seems to be a bit of a compromise on what players like Jayson Tatum, Bam Adebayo, De’Aaron Fox, and other players nearing extensions after their rookie deals were looking for in terms of added protection from injury. The wording of Woj’s report indicates this will only cover the most severe injuries or COVID-19 outcomes, but will at least offer players a bit of a security blanket in the form of “several million dollars” that mitigates at least some risk of playing again.
Still, the players returning to the bubble will face serious risk, both from the coronavirus and the possibility that after such a long layoff there will be an increase in injury risk once they jump back into competitive basketball. The insurance policy won’t protect them in totality, but it’s still good the players were able to get some kind of assistance from the league for those injury concerns.