Tuesday saw some significant progress in the NBA’s planning for a possible restart to the season. Leadership on both sides of the NBA and NBPA held meetings to discuss the path back to basketball, as Chris Paul, LeBron James, Kevin Durant, Stephen Curry, and other NBA stars spoke on a call while Adam Silver spoke with the league’s board of governors.

While the first call resulted in the league’s best players reportedly coming to an agreement that they all would like to restart the season when possible, the latter call was the more important one in terms of actually putting plans into action. Per ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski, among the discussions were locations they could play, what a bubble league may look like, testing, what other pro leagues domestically and internationally are doing, and more.

There are a lot of moving parts that need to come together for the NBA to get back on the court this summer, with the most notable issue still being testing, from availability to how rapid tests would be and what the league would do if there’s a positive test. The last point reportedly saw discussion turn to teams and players needing to be “comfortable” with the idea of continuing the season after a positive test from a player.

As for when a decision may come down, The Athletic’s Shams Charania brings word that Silver told owners he hopes to have a decision on coming back to play this season in the next 2 to 4 weeks.

That would mean we should know if the NBA will return — or at least, go forward with serious plans to return — by early June. The hurdles to doing so remain enormous, even if players and ownership both are on the same page in terms of wanting to return. Ensuring they can get the necessary testing — and do so without taking the PR hit of taking them from places that are struggling to test those showing symptoms — is the first hurdle, but that’s just one. While it’s one thing to say they’ll have to be “comfortable” with a player testing positive and going into self-quarantine away from everyone else, it’s another for that to be what actually happens should a superstar test positive in the midst of the playoffs and have to miss, effectively, an entire series. Beyond that, we know that the virus can easily spread among teammates and opponents, and while they might be willing to press on from one case, what is the plan if it’s clear the virus is spreading rapidly within their bubble.

All of this must be taken into account, but Tuesday was significant in showing progress towards that plan. The unfortunate thing — and the thing everyone is currently dealing with — is that timetables and plans are nice, but everything is dictated by the virus and, to this point, that has derailed even the best laid plans.

A single NBA player’s positive test for COVID-19, the illness caused by the novel coronavirus, caused an immediate pause on the NBA season and the subsequent suspension of all pro sports in North America. Rudy Gobert’s positive test caused a cascade of action throughout the United States and was just the first of a handful of positive tests on various NBA teams as the league shut down and tried to trace the spread of coronavirus in the Association.

Tuesday, however, brought word that if the NBA manages to restart its season in an attempt to crown a champion in 2020, a single positive COVID-19 diagnosis would not create the same chaos. Amid reports from various insiders about a conversation between major stars in the NBA and a conference call about the possibility of the league restarting later this summer was a theme stressed by NBA commissioner Adam Silver about the risks associated with a restart. Namely, if someone comes down with COVID-19 the league would not shut down immediately like it did in March.

“Getting comfortable” with life in the NBA amid positive coronavirus tests is a considerable challenge to overcome if the restart of the league is to be sustainable. Positive tests could come from asymptomatic players who spread it to others they’re in close proximity with, meaning a single positive test could lead to a cascade of new COVID-19 cases. It’s not just the inherent problem of having to remove that player or coach or staff member — no matter how valuable they are — from the lineup and back into quarantine but the fact that the person in question would then be unavailable for a matter of weeks as the season and postseason continued.

The NBA is exploring all options when it comes to resuming play, and players are interested in continuing the season and crowning a champion even if it means playing without fans. But the Association is not immune to the risks that come with grouping people together while a highly contagious and potentially deadly virus is spreading as a pandemic with little to no treatment available to fight it. Not every COVID-19 case is deadly, and several NBA players had minor cases and recovered relatively unscathed. But that’s far from the only result of contracting coronavirus, and the more time people spend together in groups like the NBA needs to actually play basketball heightens the chances of something going wrong in an attempt to finish the season. Tuesday’s news indicates the league is open to accepting those risks as necessary, and seems to be asking players and coaches to accept those terms in order to compete.

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Even if you clock lots o’ time in there, it doesn’t have to look that way to passersby.

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Who needs more clothes when you’re not going anywhere?

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“Hold my branch.” —Nature

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And they may have caught a break, after the same model of Russian ventilators burst into flames, killing six people in Moscow and St Petersburg this week.

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Over the past year or so it has become increasingly popular for NBA related Twitter accounts to post some sort of “pick ’em” grid that offers you the choice of players valued from $1-$5 and a prompt of “you have $15, who you got?”

These typically come from media or brand accounts craving that sweet, sweet engagement boost, and are often put together without too terribly much thought. However, on Tuesday, Twitter’s @LucasHoopsPoems produced arguably the best one of these pick ’em prompts I have ever seen, as there was clearly significant thought and effort put into it — as evidenced by the fact that he had friends look over it and work out some kinks before throwing it up online.

The addition of $6 players makes things much more difficult and also allows for more appropriate tiers. Because they didn’t make it fit in a neat 5 x 5 box, there are more players and, as such, the decisions you have to make are more difficult and the tiers are better divided. For instance, the $1 range features some specialists and players whose impact was clearly felt more on one end than the other, rather than being stacked with Hall of Famers.

There are also a ton of ways to go about putting together a team on this list, and all of them require some very tough decisions. Let’s go through a few of my favorite teams I’ve come up with.

The All-Never Won A Ring Team: Chris Paul, Reggie Miller, Dominique Wilkins, Charles Barkley, Joel Embiid

I feel like Reggie Miller in the $2 slot is one of the best values on the board, a testament to the guard depth in league history, and putting him next to Chris Paul would be a lot of fun. The issue with this team is, without a doubt, wing defense with Reggie and Nique, but offensively this team would rule and having Chris Paul pestering opposing point guards and Embiid lording over the middle of the paint I think we might be able to get away with it. The toughest decisions for me were Chris Paul v. Gary Payton and Barkley v. Anthony Davis, but I also love the idea of having all five of these incredible shit talkers all on one team and Davis would be the odd man out there.

First Team All-Defense: Gary Payton, Tony Allen, Kawhi Leonard, Dennis Rodman, Dikembe Mutombo

An absolute fever dream for those that wish we’d go back to those halcyon days of the playoffs when games finished in the 70s. The Glove and Tony Allen absolutely ruining opposing backcourts both physically and mentally, while Kawhi and Rodman fly around on the wings and Dikembe is ready to block anyone that makes their way to the rim.

First Team All-Offense: Allen Iverson, James Harden, Dominique Wilkins, Dirk Nowitzki, DeMarcus Cousins, (6th Man Kyle Korver)

The antithesis of the previous team, I want scorers with questionable at best defensive backgrounds (hence the selection of Harden over Kobe even though we had a dollar left over for Korver). We’re trying to average 150 points per game and I don’t care if we give up that many too. One basketball may not be enough for this team, but everyone in the starting lineup can average 25 without breaking much of a sweat.

The Best Team: Chris Paul, Reggie Miller, Kevin Durant, Kevin Love, Dwight Howard

I think this is the best team I can come up with. I can’t get over thinking CP3-Reggie is the best value backcourt combo you can make and they’re a really good fit. The forward spot is filled almost totally with fours, but I think Durant-Love works with prime Dwight anchoring things. It’s basically the concept of those late 2000s Magic — surround Dwight with shooters — but taken to a different level by adding the best pick-and-roll point guard partner possible for him, one of the best shooters in history in Reggie, one of the best scorers ever (and a tremendous wing defender) in KD, and a great shooter in Love who can rebound and knows how to play that role.