2020 NBA Bubble

• 1. Introduction

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  The 2020 NBA Bubble struck some players as a prison sentence. Walt Disney World in Bay Lake, Florida, near Orlando, was its home. It ran for 93 days across the summer and fall of 2020. Twenty-two NBA teams moved into makeshift Disney hotels and played games behind closed doors. It had all started on the 11th of March, 2020, with a single positive test. Utah Jazz center Rudy Gobert tested positive for COVID-19 just hours before a scheduled road game against the Oklahoma City Thunder. The NBA suspended its season that night. Play would not resume until the 30th of July. Could a league actually seal itself off from a pandemic? What would that containment cost the players living inside it? And what would happen when the most visible protest movement in a generation found its way onto the basketball court?

• 2. The $190 Million Bet

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  On the 4th of June, 2020, the NBA Board of Governors voted 29 to 1 to resume the season at Walt Disney World. The lone dissenting vote came from the Portland Trail Blazers. Las Vegas and Houston had both been weighed as potential sites before Orlando was chosen. The league invested $190 million in the project and ultimately recovered an estimated $1.5 billion in revenue from completing the season.

  A detailed medical protocol was published on the 17th of June, organized across six phases. The first phase ran from the 16th to the 22nd of June and had players returning to their home cities. Phase 2 introduced COVID-19 testing every other day. Teams traveled to Orlando in Phase 4, between the 7th and the 21st of July. On arrival, players stayed isolated in their hotel rooms until passing two PCR tests taken 24 hours apart. Any player who tested positive was quarantined for at least 14 days. Anyone who left the bubble without prior approval faced at least 10 days of quarantine upon return.

  The accompanying rulebook ran to more than 100 pages. Players could not enter each other's rooms or socialize with those staying at a different hotel building. The league created an anonymous reporting hotline for rule violations, which players called the "snitch hotline." Masks were required indoors at all times, with exceptions only for eating and exercise. Four players were ultimately cited for breaking the rules: Lou Williams, Richaun Holmes, Bruno Caboclo, and Danuel House. Walt Disney World's RFID-enabled MagicBands were ordinarily used as hotel keycards and theme park admission tools. For the bubble, they were repurposed as contact tracing and health compliance devices, and could restrict a player's access to practice facilities if the daily health monitoring review had not been completed.

• 3. Life at the Resort

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  LeBron James struggled with the bubble. He was quoted saying that viewers "don't quite understand the mindset" required to truly grasp what happened inside. James and Anthony Davis were among the players who reported psychological difficulties from being cut off from their families. Los Angeles Clippers forward Paul George also spoke publicly about how the isolation affected his mental health.

  Oklahoma City Thunder center Steven Adams took a different view, saying it was impossible to complain when you were staying at what amounted to a "resort." Devin Booker of the Phoenix Suns also appeared to adapt well. At least ten players chose not to participate at all. Brooklyn Nets guard Kyrie Irving declined, wanting to concentrate on ongoing social justice issues. Los Angeles Lakers guard Avery Bradley opted out because his six-year-old son was battling a respiratory illness.

  Philadelphia 76ers center Joel Embiid photographed his food and posted it publicly, saying he was "definitely losing 50 lbs." Orlando Magic forward Aaron Gordon described the atmosphere as "strange," while Utah Jazz guard Mike Conley Jr. called it "surreal." Miami Heat forward Jimmy Butler responded differently, opening a coffee shop inside the bubble and charging other players $20 per cup. Butler also chose not to have his family visit, framing his time there as a "business trip." Starting on the 31st of August, players were permitted to pay for one guest room. A family member or close associate could join them, provided the guest completed a week of quarantine on arrival.

• 4. Broadcasting From a Closed Set

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  ESPN and Turner Sports installed more than 100 cameras across the three arenas at the ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex. New angles were introduced that had not appeared in regular NBA broadcasts, among them a rail camera at the side of the court and cameras mounted at the free-throw line. Production staff and many on-air announcers from both networks were physically present inside the bubble. Regional broadcasters received live feeds and called their games remotely from home studios.

  Marv Albert, Turner's play-by-play announcer who was 79 years old at the time, declined to be present inside the bubble. He cited his age as a risk factor for severe COVID-19 illness. ESPN color commentator Hubie Brown, then 87, made the same decision for the same reason.

  The NBA mounted 17-foot screens around the courts to display multimedia content and a mosaic of virtual spectators, powered by Microsoft Teams. The league ran a promotional campaign called "It's a Whole New Game" to mark the resumption. Game broadcasts were also augmented in real time with graphics inserted onto the court floor, including each home team's actual logo and the name of their real arena, a technique comparable to one already used in NFL broadcasts.

• 5. On the Court

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  Portland Trail Blazers guard Damian Lillard averaged 37.6 points per game and was named Seeding Games Most Valuable Player. He made the All-Seeding Games First Team alongside Devin Booker, Luka Doncic, James Harden, and T.J. Warren. Monty Williams of the Phoenix Suns was named Coach of the Seeding Games. His Suns had been projected to lose most of their games but went a perfect 8-0.

  The playoffs opened on the 17th of August. The NBA Finals began on the 30th of September. On the 11th of October, the Los Angeles Lakers defeated the Miami Heat in six games to win the championship. Avery Bradley, who had declined to enter the bubble, received a championship ring alongside his teammates. In the two weeks leading up to the resumption of play, two consecutive weeks of zero positive COVID-19 tests among players had been recorded. By the 19th of August, five consecutive weeks without a positive player test had been logged. From the first seeding game to the final game of the championship series, not one COVID-19 case was recorded among the participating teams.

  Near the end of the regular season, NBA Commissioner Adam Silver stated that the bubble had turned out "better than what we had envisioned." The conference finals were scheduled to run from the 15th to the 28th of September at the AdventHealth Arena, the bubble's primary court. Before they could begin, the season paused for reasons that had nothing to do with basketball.

• 6. A Movement Enters the Arena

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  The George Floyd protests were ongoing as teams arrived in the bubble. The NBA, the National Basketball Players Association, and the clubs worked together to use the moment for the Black Lives Matter movement. The phrase was painted in large font on all official basketball courts. Players wore shirts bearing the words during warmups and on the bench. They were also offered the option to replace the name on the back of their jersey with a personal statement in support of the movement. National anthems for bubble games were pre-recorded and performed exclusively by African American artists.

  Orlando Magic forward Jonathan Isaac became the first player to stand during the national anthem and to decline wearing a Black Lives Matter warm-up shirt. He cited religious reasons for his decision. Other players respected his choice, even those who disagreed. Miami Heat forward Meyers Leonard also stood, saying his decision came from his support for the military. San Antonio Spurs head coach Gregg Popovich, an outspoken supporter of the movement, chose to stand as well, as did Spurs assistant coach Becky Hammon. Sean Roberts, a Republican member of the Oklahoma House of Representatives, threatened to pull tax breaks from the Oklahoma City Thunder if they kneeled. Every player and coach from both the Thunder and the opposing Utah Jazz kneeled anyway.

  On the 26th of August, the Milwaukee Bucks boycotted Game 5 of their first-round series against the Orlando Magic. The action was a direct response to the shooting of Jacob Blake in Kenosha, Wisconsin. The NBA postponed all games scheduled for that day. The National Basketball Players Association held an emergency meeting. The Los Angeles Lakers and Los Angeles Clippers voted not to play out the remainder of the season, but every other team voted to continue. All games on the 27th of August were postponed as well. The playoffs resumed on the 29th of August after the NBA and NBPA reached agreement on three social justice commitments. One of those commitments was opening NBA arenas as voting centers for the election that fall.

• 7. What the Bubble Left Behind

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  Seventeen of the twenty-eight eligible NBA G League teams competed at the ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex. Their season ran from the 10th of February to the 6th of March, 2021, in what media outlets called the "2021 G League Bubble." Each team played fifteen regular season games with no divisional or conference structure. The eight best teams then competed in a single-elimination playoff beginning the 8th of March. On the 11th of March, the championship game ended 97-78, with the Lakeland Magic defeating the Delaware Blue Coats. The Lakeland Magic are the Orlando Magic's G League affiliate; the Delaware Blue Coats serve the Philadelphia 76ers. Devin Cannady was named Finals Most Valuable Player.

  Eight teams that did not enter the NBA bubble in Orlando were collectively referred to as the "Delete Eight." A second bubble in Chicago was briefly proposed to give them some competitive play during the shutdown, but the plan fell through. On the 20th of August, 2020, the NBA and NBPA announced that those eight teams could hold voluntary group workouts at home. Those sessions could begin as early as the 4th of September.

  The International Olympic Committee drew on the NBA's biosecurity model when developing protocols for the 2020 Summer Olympics. That event had been delayed to 2021 and was held in Tokyo. Within the NBA, the bubble's methods became official policy: a contingency plan standing ready for any future pandemic or major disease outbreak.

  On the 24th of March, 2021, HBO and Oh Dip!!! Productions released a documentary called "The Day Sports Stood Still" on HBO Max. NBA player Chris Paul had contacted film producer Brian Grazer around the time of the season's suspension, and that conversation set the project in motion. The film examined how the murders of Breonna Taylor and Ahmaud Arbery had shaped the NBA's planning for the bubble from the earliest stages. Paul made that initial call at the moment when every other major sports league was facing the same question: how, and whether, to return.