In a previous life, the NBA playoffs would have started this Saturday. In this, the news is different. The league is still stopped by the coronavirus, has no return date and is not even sure that it can. Analysts estimate that he could lose about $ 500 million if he cancels the rest of the regular season and more than $ 1,000 million if he cancels the season. To soften the blow, the players have agreed to lower the salary.

The players union had been negotiating with the NBA for weeks. It was not just a question of how much, but of when: the vast majority receive their payroll every two weeks and wanted everyone to have a mattress before taking this step. From next May 15 until the end of 2020, the league will retain 25% to all players. They will only get it back if the league manages to resume.

In the NBA salaries are regulated by agreement: at the end of the season, the money that the league has entered must have been distributed equally between the players and the franchises (never more than 51%, never less than 49%). To ensure this distribution, 10% of each payroll goes to a common fund and at the end of the course the accounts are balanced. In anticipation of multi-million dollar losses, the percentage now rises to 25%.

Just hours after the announcement, Commissioner Adam Silver reiterated that everything is still up in the air. It is not certain that the NBA will cancel games, but neither that it can play them again, nor when, or under what conditions. "Based on the reports we have from independent experts and those responsible for public health, we are not yet making any decisions and it is not clear when we will be," he said.

The NBA was the first major professional league in North America to suspend the season. On March 12, just four minutes after learning of Rudy Gobert's coronavirus positive , the league suspended the course. Silver assured that the players affected by the Covid-19 are more than the seven that were initially announced, but he did not want to give numbers or names.

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