NBA coronavirus 'bubble' for season restart costs $150M: Report
NBA’s expenses include meals, daily entertainment, COVID-19 testing.
After halting due to coronavirus, the 2020 NBA season is set to begin on July 31.
The NBA will shell out more than $150 million over three months to operate its “bubble” environment at Walt Disney World resort in Florida during the coronavirus pandemic, according to a report Wednesday.
League officials have developed a comprehensive health and safety plan to protect employees and members of the 22 teams that will participate in the season restart beginning on July 30. The NBA’s expenses include meals, daily entertainment, COVID-19 testing and various other measures laid out in their 100-page plan to safely resume play, ESPN reported.
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"It comes into play that we feel an obligation to our sport and to the industry to find a new normal," NBA commissioner Adam Silver told Time magazine at a forum earlier this week. "It doesn't come into play in terms of dollars and cents because, frankly, it's not all that economical for us to play on this campus. It's enormously expensive."
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The NBA hasn’t played since mid-March when the worsening pandemic made games a public health hazard. The 22 participating teams will play games without fans in attendance at three courts on Disney’s Wide World of Sports complex.
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The NBA is projecting losses in revenue of more than $1 billion due to the impact of coronavirus. The season restart will help to preserve revenue from the NBA’s lucrative media rights deals.
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NBA players and staffers are prohibited from leaving the bubble on the Disney campus once they enter. Any player who breaks protocol will have to self-quarantine for 10 days and test negative for COVID-19 before returning to play.
Several players have opted out of the restart, citing concerns related to health and the possibility that a resumption of NBA play would distract from social justice issues.