A new format will be implemented in the NBA All-Star Game this upcoming season.

The format is expected to be a round-robin style tournament with two teams compiled with American players and one team with internationals, according to ESPN’s Shams Charania. Each team will have eight players and will play 12-minute quarters.

The upcoming All-Star Game, hosted on Feb. 15 at the Intuit Dome in Los Angeles, will be changing formats again after mixed reviews from the 2025 edition. Instead of a traditional East vs West game, the 2025 edition featured a single-elimination tournament of four teams.

Some players, like Trae Young of the Atlanta Hawks, weren’t fans of the four-team tournament.

“To be honest, I didn’t like it at all,” Young said. “I didn’t like the breaks. The games were so short.”

Next year’s newest edition is the latest attempt by the NBA to increase viewership of the competition. The 2025 edition drew 4.7 million viewers: a 13% decrease from the previous year, making it the second-lowest viewed All-Star Game since 2000.

The new format will also be played in the middle of the 2026 Winter Olympics, something NBA commissioner Adam Silver said it was “not lost on us” that the games would be held at the same time as the event in Los Angeles.

NBA expansion has been heating up with talks on expansion, and everyone knows it. This July, expect the NBA to turn up the heat.

That was the takeaway from NBA Commissioner Adam Silver, speaking to the media before Game 1 of the NBA Finals. He was asked about the owners’ temperature on expansion.

“I’d say the current sense is we should be exploring it,” Silver said. “I don’t think it’s automatic because it depends on your perspective on the future of the league. As I’ve said before, expansion, in a way, is selling equity in the league. If you believe in the league, you don’t necessarily want to add partners. On the other hand, we recognize there are underserved markets in the United States and elsewhere.”

“We have an owners’ meeting in July in Las Vegas. It will be on the agenda to take the temperature of the room. We have committees that are already talking about it. But my sense is at that meeting, they’re going to give direction to me and my colleagues at the league office that we should continue to explore it.”

That exploration will be a more formal process, although Silver, who is always cautious in his public statements, wouldn’t go beyond that.

“What I expect is if a decision is made that there should be further exploration by the league office and presumably a committee of team owners, it would be more of a formal process,” Silver said.

What that likely means is the league starts meeting with potential ownership groups.

“There’s been no lack of interest. Certainly, I’ve gotten a lot of unsolicited calls,” Silver said. “I essentially have said to people from several different cities. We’re just not engaging in that process right now. I want to be fair to everyone. So I don’t want to have meeting with some and not others. … so if we were to say yes, we’re now going to move into a more formal exploratory phase, we would take those meetings and in addition likely would engage with outside advisors who would look at markets, look at economic opportunities and media opportunities, et cetera.”

The expectation is that the league will move forward with two teams for expansion in cities like Seattle and, most likely, Las Vegas. Silver had wanted to wait for a new CBA and television deal, which have happened recently.

The NBA also waited for the sale of the Boston Celtics before moving forward, so the league could have an idea what it could ask for in expansion fees. The sale of the Portland Trail Blazers will also be factored into that expansion price tag.

When NBA Commissioner Adam Silver announced in March that the format of the league’s All-Star Game would be pivoting, it seemed pretty natural to infer that there would be an international element.

The announcement came in the wake of an, um, down year for the NBA All-Star festivities. The game itself commanded just 4.7 million viewers, down 13% from the previous season and 80% from past All-Star games. “We’re not there in terms of creating an All-Star experience that we can be proud of and that our players can be proud of,” Silver acknowledged afterward.

Meanwhile, the NHL replaced their All-Star weekend with the Four Nations Face-Off, played between Finland, Sweden, Canada and the United States. The USA-Canada final drew over 16 million viewers worldwide – rivaling last year’s Stanley Cup Finals Game 7. That’s good business.

For the NBA, which is already playing its 2026 All-Star Game during the Winter Olympics, an international lean is natural. The game will also be played at Intuit Dome, the location of the 2028 Summer Olympics.

“We’ll be competing in the arena at Intuit, where the basketball competition will take place in the 2028 Olympics,” Silver said. “So I think all of those factors, when they come together, it presents an enormous opportunity for us to do something with an international competition instead of the traditional All-Star formats that we’ve used.”

So what will that competition look like?

About 70% of all NBA players are American, so a tournament representing several disparate nations, like the NHL’s, is likely off the table. Byron Spruell, the NBA’s president of league operations, remarked specifically on “formats that lean into this idea of international play, to some extent leaning a little bit on this idea of U.S. versus rest of the world.”

“The USA has more talented players than the rest of the world,” said Nikola Jokic earlier this year. “Europe and the rest of the world has talented players, I think, but the majority of the players are coming from USA.”

In such a consolidated matchup, though, the talent would be close. Jokic, Giannis Antetokounmpo, Victor Wembanyama and Luka Doncic are just a few of the probable names for the international roster. It would be difficult to argue there’s a lack of talent there.

The All-Star game is still nearly ten months out, so details likely haven’t been hammered out yet. But it now seems like the format – USA versus the World – has been set. The rest, including the amount of success it’ll have, remains to be seen.

NBA commissioner Adam Silver spoke bluntly on Thursday about the 2025 All-Star tournament format, which drew criticism from just about every corner of basketball media.

“It was a miss,” Silver said. “We’re not there in terms of creating an All-Star experience that we can be proud of and that our players can be proud of.”

The league deviated from its usual East vs. West format this year following a consistent decline in effort and a 2024 All-Star game that ended with a score of 211-186. Instead, it featured a four-team tournament, with the 24 All-Stars being divided into three teams, plus a fourth team of “Rising Stars.” The games were played to 40 points.

Silver said he felt the format was “a little better,” but acknowledged criticisms, including a nearly 20-minute break during the championship game meant to recognize the TNT broadcast team. “It was well-intentioned,” he said. “But I think the long stoppage in play in that final game didn’t work for anyone.”

Criticism of the NBA format was amplified as a result of the wild success of the NHL’s Four Nations Face Off, which pitted stars from the USA, Canada, Sweden and Finland against each other. Silver alluded to similar nation-based suggestions for the NBA All-Star break, saying, “there are some different national teams that can compete.”

The 2026 Winter Olympics will also take place in February, and could serve as a lead-in to a lucrative All-Star game based on national squads. For now, with a complete retool on the board, the NBA will be looking to make its All-Star festivities a highlight – not an embarrassment.

NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said Wednesday that he was a “fan” of shortening the league’s quarters from 12 minutes to 10 minutes. Though the change would undermine the NBA’s traditions and record-keeping, Silver noted that it would also be an intuitive fix to one of the league’s most pressing issues.

“Incidentally, if you went to a 40-minute game, with the minutes around load management and resting, it would be the equivalent of — I don’t know the exact math — taking like 15 games off the season,” Silver said on The Dan Patrick Show Wednesday. “And I don’t think most fans would be disappointed if it was a two-hour presentation instead of a — our game is actually about two hours and 15 minutes now.”

The commissioner has earned a reputation for bucking trends in his decade-long tenure, respecting the league’s history while embracing new ideas to maintain relevance. The NBA Cup, the league’s new in-season tournament, was Silver’s initiative to boost regular season ratings. Limiting end-of-season awards to players who compete in a certain number of games was another attempt to convince teams to avoid excessive load management.

These ideas, while novel and unfamiliar for the league, were also baked into the NBA’s existing spirit and structure. Star players are supposed to compete every night; the regular season is supposed to mean something. In this sense, many of Silver’s splashiest rule changes were actually intended to uphold the league’s traditions.

Shortening quarters, on the other hand, would be a massive departure, and therefore a harder sell for owners and other officials. Silver pointed out that most leagues in the world now play 10-minute quarters and that a two-hour format would be better suited to television broadcasting, but this could only further solidify NBA traditionalists in their way of thinking.

The commissioner’s office has already demonstrated that it is willing to consider anything to improve the product for modern viewers. Those efforts have yielded mixed results to this point, as many still argue that load management and low effort are harming the league’s product in the regular season. As persistent as ever, Silver is still looking for new breakthroughs.

NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said Wednesday that the league intends to take action to “tweak” and “correct” rules that have led to excessive three-point shooting. Part of a decades-long trend, Silver recognizes that many fans have soured on the convention as three-point shots now account for more than 40% of all field goal attempts across the league.

In his appearance on The Herd with Colin Cowherd, Silver agreed that excessive three-point shooting has weakened the product for viewers. He also said that the issue was not a simple one to fix, requiring a nuanced approach.  

“So I think we’ve just gotta be careful. The one thing we don’t want to do is, I don’t want to just kneejerk move the three-point line,” Silver said in his interview with Cowherd. “We’re sort of going through a process now, seeing how these players are adapting to the new rules, and figuring out what changes we should make. To be honest, I wish it was as simple as just moving the three-point line back, because then we would just do it.”

Silver’s primary concern is that any measures to manipulate the rate of three-point shooting would harm the product in other ways. By moving back the three-point line, for instance, he and other NBA officials fear that play would become too concentrated in the paint. The commissioner recalled periods where the NBA was criticized for too much play under the rim, at the expense of other fundamentals. Instead of submitting to the whim of public sentiment, he seems intent on finding a long-term solution.

The dominance of the perimeter shot in the NBA is easy to trace through the years. The Phoenix Suns’ motion offense under Mike D’Antoni in the mid-2000s was an obvious spark, as Steve Nash spearheaded an elite offense intent on scoring in seven seconds or less each possession. But that spark wouldn’t ignite until the 2010s, when the Golden State Warriors built a dynasty founded on elite shooting.

Steph Curry and Klay Thompson, nicknamed the Splash Brothers, provided historic production from beyond the arc and led the Warriors won four championships in eight years. Early successors to this strategy, most notably the Houston Rockets, failed to match Golden State’s success, but the trend continued all the same. 

In the 2023-24 season, the Boston Celtics shot more three-pointers than two-pointers, becoming the first team in NBA history to do so. It was a revelatory offensive strategy that finally allowed Boston to win its 18th championship, but for some, it was the escalation that turned a dynamic offensive system into an unattractive form of basketball.

Instead of acknowledging the three-point issue, as Silver has readily done in the past, the NBA commissioner has finally taken the next step and agreed to take action. With the help of NBA Executive Vice President Joe Dumars, Silver has vowed to find a solution soon.

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During a pre-NBA Finals press conference, NBA Commissioner Adam Silver made a significant announcement, setting the stage for the league’s potential expansion. This comes in the wake of a new media rights agreement that has been a topic of discussion for the 2023-24 season. Silver provided detailed insights into adding new franchises to the league.

“Media deals, it’s been a long process. It’s ongoing, and we hope to wrap it up in the relatively near term, and then we will turn to expansion. But by turning to expansion, it doesn’t mean we’re going to announce that now we’re ready to add teams. This means there will be a committee of NBA governors to focus on. There are markets out there that are very interested and will run through a process.”

The NBA has flirted with expansion but has had the same 30 teams since the Charlotte Bobcats, now Hornets, entered the league in 2004. The last squad to relocate was the New Jersey Nets, who moved north to Brooklyn in 2012.

While the NBA stays stagnant, the other major sports leagues in the United States have changed their landscape. Since 2018, the NHL added two new teams, the Las Vegas Knights and Seattle Kraken, pushing its league to 32 squads. The NFL and MLB have not added a new team in recent years. Still, multiple teams relocated, including the Oakland Raiders moving to Las Vegas, and the Oakland Athletics expected to head east to Sin City in a couple of years. The NBA considers Seattle and Las Vegas the first cities to receive a new team with large sports markets and stadiums already built.

While yet to be official, estimates believe the new media rights deal for the NBA will be around $76 billion and allow games to be broadcast on multiple channels and streaming services. Adding an expansion team could cost between $3-4 billion as the prices of sports teams skyrocketed in recent years, most recently with the sale of the Hornets last year for $3 billion.

Jerry West, the iconic NBA player whose silhouette graces the league’s logo, died on Wednesday morning, according to an announcement by the Los Angeles Clippers. West, 86, died with his wife, Karen, by his side.

In a statement, NBA Commissioner Adam Silver lauded West’s unparalleled contributions to the sport, calling him a “basketball genius” and a “defining figure in our league for more than 60 years.”

Silver highlighted West’s dual legacy as both an exceptional player and a visionary, “He distinguished himself not only as an NBA champion and an All-Star in all 14 of his playing seasons but also as a consummate competitor who embraced the biggest moments,” Silver said to CNN.

West, affectionately known as “Mr. Clutch” for his ability to perform under pressure, was drafted by the Minneapolis Lakers in 1960. Over his 14-year career, West established himself as one of the game’s greatest point guards and shooting guards, earning 14 All-Star selections and leading the Lakers to the NBA Finals nine times. His legendary status was further cemented when he became a co-captain of the gold-medal-winning U.S. Olympic basketball team in 1960.

West’s strategic mind was seen through his executive roles, where he played a pivotal part in assembling championship-winning teams. His contributions to the sport will be formally recognized this October when he is inducted into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame as a contributor, making him the first person to receive this honor as both a player and a contributor.

The basketball community mourns the loss of a figure whose impact was felt across generations. West’s legacy is not only etched in the history books but also in the hearts of fans and players who revered him.

“On behalf of the NBA, we send our deepest condolences to Jerry’s wife, Karen, his family, and his many friends in the NBA community,” Silver said.

On Wednesday, NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said he was not ruling out a lifetime ban as the league continues investigating Toronto Raptors forward Jontay Porter. The role player is accused of manipulating his stats to collect money through sports gambling.

Silver commented about Porter in Manhattan after the league’s board of governors meeting. He said he still considered several punishments as the league’s investigation continues.

“I have an enormous range of discipline available to me,” Silver said. “But it’s a cardinal sin, what he’s accused of in the NBA, and the ultimate, extreme option I have is to ban him from the game.”

Silver said that Porter’s actions might deserve such an extreme action, as insider betting by players arguably goes against the spirit of competition and the league’s countless rules that enforce it.

“That’s the level of authority I have here,” Silver said. “Because there’s nothing more serious, I think, around this league when it comes to gambling: betting on our games. And that is a direct player involvement. And so, the investigation is ongoing, but the consequences could be very severe.”

The league first began its investigation into Porter in late March after a series of large prop bets involving Porter cashed in specific games in the previous two months. DraftKings Sportsbook reported that these bets were irregular and highly successful.

Though Porter is not a star, he is one of the first players directly implicated in-game tampering in the modern sports betting era. Many speculated that a thawing relationship between leagues, media outlets and sportsbooks would eventually lead to such scandals.

If the league concludes that Porter tampered with NBA games to cash bets on himself, it will likely take the opportunity to make an example of him and set a precedent for future cases. However, it is unclear if the league’s actions against players will do enough to counteract its embrace of gambling as a form of marketing.

The NBA wrapped up its 2023-24 All-Star Weekend in Indianapolis with the 73rd edition of the All-Star game. Though it was the highest-scoring contest in history, with the East beating the West 211-186, it was marked again by minimal effort by players and a now-famous lack of defense. Milwaukee Bucks guard Damian Lillard won the All-Star Game MVP award after finishing with 39 points on 11 made three-pointers for the East.

“And to the Eastern Conference All-Stars, you scored the most points,” NBA commissioner Adam Silver said after the game. “Well … congratulations.”

Silver had high expectations that the game would differ from those in the past and offer fans something they hadn’t seen in recent years. Despite his hopes, his sarcastic comments after the game seem to mirror fans’ and players’ thoughts.

“I think it’s something we need to figure out,” Los Angeles Lakers forward LeBron James said. “Obviously from a player’s perspective, it’s fun to get up and down. But at the end of the day, our competitive nature don’t like to have free-flowing scoring like that.”

The All-Star Game and weekend as a whole have been an issue for the NBA for many years, but the league has done little compared to others to change that. The NFL, NHL and MLB have all restructured their All-Star events to cater to fans and to minimize the lack of effort seen in Indianapolis over the weekend. Silver and the NBA have made groundbreaking changes with the introduction of the Play-In Tournament which is unseen in any other major American sports, but are still looking to fix their All-Star Weekend.

“For me, it’s an All-Star Game, so I will never look at it as being super competitive,” Minnesota Timberwolves guard Anthony Edwards said. “It’s always fun. I don’t know what they can do to make it more competitive. I don’t know. I think everyone looks at it … it’s a break, so I don’t think everyone wants to come here and compete.”

Despite the fact that the events are intended to showcase the league’s best talent, the NBA All-Star Game and its lack of competition continue to be an issue.

Along with the fact that the game doesn’t hold any true meaning, players also don’t want to risk an injury, and would rather play safer and less competitive than normal. Fans also experience the downsides of the All-Star weekend as despite paying hundreds of dollars for a ticket to see the best players in the world, they end up just watching a glorified shoot-around. The game over the weekend was also the first since 2020 without an Elam Ending, a final target score that the team’s need to reach, which provided exciting endings in recent years.

“Hopefully, as years go on, [the All-Star Game] gets back to being what the fans wanna see … I guess guys are trying to figure out how to play hard and be safe at the same time,” Boston Celtics guard Jaylen Brown said after the game.

The 2024 All-Star Game was the first NBA game to see a team reach 200 points, but regardless of the record it seems as though changes to create a more competitive game need to be made. The NBA has yet to announce if any changes will be made to their next All-Star Weekend, which will take place at the Chase Center in San Fransisco in 2025.

NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said that the league was considering changes that would bring back the East/West format for the league’s annual All-Star Game. Instead of a game between the conferences, the event has been contested with star team captains since 2018, one of several efforts to make the game more interesting to viewers.

“We’re looking at some potential changes in format in Indianapolis this year,” Silver said about the 2024 All-Star Game on ESPN’s First Take Wednesday. “Maybe a return to something more traditional in terms of how the teams are presented. We went to sort of this captain and draft notion, but clearly, historically it was East vs. West. So that’s maybe something we are looking at.”

The return to tradition Silver referred to first began in 1951, when the first All-Star Game officially took place between the best players from the East and West Conference. The format remained largely unchanged until 2017. In the new captain format, LeBron James has perennially served as one of the team leaders and played against one of either Steph Curry, Kevin Durant or Giannis Antetokounmpo. Ratings reached an all-time low in 2023.

“The All-Star Weekend is quite a spectacle,” Silver said. “I’m always sort of laughing because before the game even starts on Sunday afternoon, people are saying, ‘This is the best ever!’ And I’m like, ‘We’ll, we’ve got this game.’ I’ll take some fault for that because when you’re there this year in Indianapolis, beginning essentially Thursday night and then through Sunday, I think it’s an opportunity for this whole global basketball community to come together. Great legends of the game. Not just the All-Stars, but lots of players. I don’t know how it works in other sports, but we have dozens and dozens of players in the league who choose to come to All-Star Weekend for the activities for various events who aren’t even All-Stars. So I think we’ve lost sight a bit that it’s about the game at the end of the day.”

The NBA is not the only league that has struggled to entice viewers for its All-Star Game in recent years. The NFL’s Pro Bowl has suffered to such an extent that officials are considering overhauling the entire event, while the NHL has implemented more skills contests to improve the quality of the event.

The NBA board of governors unanimously voted Wednesday to approve harsher rules for teams looking to rest “star” players during the regular season. The rules are intended to increase competitive play during the NBA regular season, which has been criticized in recent years for a perceived lack of player interest.

“I think we’ll state this principle, see how teams react and see if more needs to be done,” NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said after the meeting. “But I think, most importantly, there’s a sense from all the different constituent groups in the league that this is ultimately about the fans and that we’ve taken this too far.”

The rules, which will take effect this coming season, define a “star player” as one that has made the All-Star Game or All-NBA teams in the previous three seasons. Half of the league currently has multiple players that qualify. Some teams, like the Warriors and their four-star players, will be impacted severely.

The rules dictate that teams must manage their rosters in a way that no more than one healthy star player is unavailable for a game. Teams must also ensure that star players are available for nationally televised games and games counting toward the in-season tournament. Shutdowns, in which a player significantly cuts back on in-game participation for a stretch of games, will also be limited. Star players’ availability must be balanced between home and road games and must also be visible to fans if they are resting.

“I mean, this is an acknowledgment that it’s gotten away from us a bit, particularly I think when you see young, healthy players who are resting,” Silver said. “It becomes maybe even more notion of stature around the league as opposed to absolute needed rest –  or it’s just part of being an NBA player that you rest on certain days – and that’s what we’re trying to move away from.”

Teams who fail to follow these new rules will have to pay $100,000 and $250,000 for first and second offenses, respectively. Penalties incurred thereafter will result in fines incrementally increased by $1 million.

This massive effort by the league to promote regular season competition is expected to increase the NBA’s ratings, as more fans should technically want to tune in for games that feel more meaningful. It is unclear how these new regulations, along with the in-season tournament, will impact the manner in which teams operate.

The Houston Rockets are exploring trade options for shooting guard Kevin Porter Jr., who was charged with felony assault and strangulation charges earlier this week. Porter is being accused of attacking his girlfriend in a New York City hotel Monday, fracturing a vertebra in her neck and cutting her face above the right eye.

Porter was released from police custody on Tuesday on $75,000 bond and will have to return to court in New York on Oct. 16. NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said Wednesday that the league had opened an investigation into Porter’s actions in order to determine if he can play through court proceedings.

“The allegations here are horrific, no question about it,” Silver said. “But I don’t know anything more about the actual facts, other than reading those allegations. We’re not in season. … We have a bit of time to decide whether it would be appropriate for him to go to training camp or not.”

According to The Athletic, the Rockets have contacted several teams for a trade involving Porter, offering draft compensation in return. Houston has prepared for a very competitive 2023-24 season and seems to be trading Porter away for a player who can contribute immediately. Porter is not expected to join the team in training camp in October.

It could be extremely difficult for the Rockets to trade away Porter because of the issues facing him beyond the basketball court. The guard was very effective last season, scoring 19.2 points per game, but it will be difficult to convince a team to take a player facing felony charges.

Porter signed a contract extension with the Rockets last October and is scheduled to receive $15.86 million for the next four years. A suspension or ban from competition, as well as prison time if he is convicted, would likely nullify most of the money Houston or any other NBA team would have to pay him as part of this deal.

The NBA and National Basketball Player’s Association agreed to a new CBA Wednesday, which will take effect this weekend and remain in effect through the 2029-30 season. Among a number of changes, the league will host an in-season tournament, intended to bolster ratings and player participation early in the season.

The in-season tournament, which will be implemented this fall, will feature all 30 teams in specific games during the first two months of the season. There will be a group stage followed by a knockout stage, and players on the final four teams remaining will be compensated. Every game except the championship game will count towards the regular season.

The idea for a special event during the regular season has been a longtime pet project of NBA Commissioner Adam Silver, who is looking to incentivize competition in the early stages of the season. At a business convention in April, he also said that an additional tournament would be another step toward embracing the league’s increasingly international identity.

“Taking a page from European soccer where they play for multiple cups throughout the season,” Silver said. “We think taking nothing away from the Larry O’Brien trophy, and the ultimate goal of winning a championship, that you can create another competition within the season that becomes meaningful. And there’s a recognition that new traditions are not built overnight.”

Silver’s new tournament comes as a sort of counterculture movement within the league, which has shifted more and more toward self-preservation during the regular season. Star players will often rest as much as possible to avoid injuries and general fatigue in preparation for the playoffs, which has diminished the importance of the first few months of the season. It is unclear if an in-season tournament would solve this issue on its own, though the CBA also added a new 65-game requirement for receiving NBA honors.

In addition to the new tournament format and 65-game threshold, the CBA also added a second salary cap apron, $17.5 million over the current one, which will impose further restrictions on teams who spend more. Players will also be permitted to smoke marijuana without receiving a suspension.

Memphis Grizzlies star Ja Morant could receive a lengthy suspension at the start of next season after he was featured on social media brandishing a handgun in a club. Morant was punished for nearly the exact same thing back in March and received an eight-game suspension.

Upon hearing of Morant’s second offense, NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said he was taken off guard by the development. After the first incident, Morant pledged to work on himself and provide a better example to young fans.

“Honestly, I was shocked when I saw this weekend that video,” Silver told ESPN at the draft lottery Tuesday. “Now, we’re in the process of investigating it, and we’ll figure out exactly what happened to the best we can. The video is a bit grainy and all that, but I’m assuming the worst.”

Morant has already been suspended by the Grizzlies from all team activities, but the league’s investigation is still ongoing and could lead to a significant in-season suspension. Some analysts claim he could miss the entire season.

Following Silver’s comments on the issue, Morant issued a statement that echoes the one he made after his first offense. He recognized that his promises this time around carried less weight but affirmed that he was still working on moving forward.

“I know I’ve disappointed a lot of people who have supported me,” Morant said in the statement. “This is a journey and I recognize there is more work to do. My words may not mean much right now, but I take full accountability for my actions. I’m committed to continuing to work on myself.”

Since Morant released his statement, Nike has pulled his signature shoe from its app, a clear sign that the company is distancing itself from the star. Further endorsements and partnerships could fall through as the league’s investigation carries on.

Memphis Grizzlies point guard Ja Morant has been served an eight-game suspension without pay for brandishing a handgun in a Denver nightclub earlier this month. The incident was captured on Instagram Live. The NBA announced his suspension in a statement that also included a comment from Commissioner Adam Silver.

“Ja’s conduct was irresponsible, reckless and potentially very dangerous,” Silver said.  “It also has serious consequences given his enormous following and influence, particularly among young fans who look up to him. He has expressed sincere contrition and remorse for his behavior.  Ja has also made it clear to me that he has learned from this incident and that he understands his obligations and responsibility to the Memphis Grizzlies and the broader NBA community extend well beyond his play on the court.”

Shortly after the suspension was announced, Morant spoke to Jalen Rose on ESPN about the incident. It was his first time speaking to the media since the incident took place on March 4. Though the Grizzlies star defended himself, reaffirming that the gun in the video wasn’t his, he also admitted that he made mistakes and would work to improve his reputation.

“The gun wasn’t mine,” Morant said. “It’s not who I am. I don’t condone any type of violence, but I take full responsibility for my actions. I’ve made a bad mistake. I can see the image that I’ve painted over myself with my recent mistakes. In the future, I’m gonna show everybody who Ja really is, what I’m about and change this narrative.”

Morant will not face charges for the incident after investigators confirmed that the gun did not belong to him. He said that he has already begun several therapy treatments in an attempt to better control himself in times of struggle. He will be eligible to return to the team on March 20, when the Grizzlies take on Dallas Mavericks.

“I realize what I have to lose, and for us as a group, what we have to lose. It’s pretty much just that being more responsible, more smarter and staying away from all the bad decisions.”

Following his team-issued suspension Thursday, Brooklyn Nets star Kyrie Irving issued an apology for promoting an antisemitic film on social media. Nets General Manager Sean Marks said Friday that he expects more, however, and will require Irving to meet with Jewish leaders and the team before he can step back on the floor.

The most recent controversy surrounding Irving first began last week, when the Nets guard praised “Hebrews to Negroes: Wake Up Black America,” a film with antisemitic themes and messages. In subsequent interviews and press conferences, Irving repeatedly evaded questions about his beliefs and refused to apologize, only doing so after he was suspended indefinitely by the team Thursday.

“To all Jewish families and communities that are hurt and affected from my post, I am deeply sorry to have caused you pain, and I apologize,” Irving wrote on Instagram. “I initially reacted out of emotion to being unjustly labeled antisemitic, instead of focusing on the healing process of my Jewish brothers and sisters that were hurt from the hateful remarks made in the documentary.”

The apology seems to have come too late for some, including NBA Commissioner Adam Silver, Nets owner Joe Tsai and Marks, who described it as a “step in the right direction.”

““There is going to be some remedial steps and measures that have been put in place for him to, obviously, seek some counseling designated by the team,” Marks said. “We’ll evaluate and see if this is the right opportunity to bring him back.”

Attempts earlier this week within the organization seemed to involve an effort to discuss the matter with Irving and come to an understanding. Both he and the organization pledged to donate $500,000 each to anti-hate causes. Marks said that this approach “obviously did not work.”

On the floor, the Nets were struggling before Irving’s suspension and haven’t recovered since, losing seven of their last eight games. Teammate and fellow star player Kevin Durant did not support or condemn Irving when asked to comment on his behavior.

“I ain’t here to judge nobody or talk down on the life or how they feel, their views or anything,” Durant said. “I just didn’t like anything that went on. I felt like it was all unnecessary. I felt like we could have just kept playing basketball and kept quiet as an organization. I just don’t like none of it.”

After receiving criticism for his original comments, Durant later clarified that he condemns hate speech and anti-semitism.

LeBron James wants to be an NBA owner, and in a direct plea to the commissioner Wednesday night, he said that he already has a spot picked out.

During a press conference following the Los Angeles Lakers’ preseason game in Las Vegas against the Phoenix Suns, James received a question about the venue of the exhibition game and took the opportunity to send a message to Adam Silver.

“I would love to bring a team here at some point. That would be amazing. I know Adam is in Abu Dhabi right now, I believe, but he probably sees every single interview and transcript that comes through from NBA players,” James said. “So, I want the team here, Adam. Thank you.”

James has previously expressed a desire to one day become an NBA owner, and already owns stakes in the Boston Red Sox and Liverpool F.C. He recently partnered with fellow NBA players Draymond Green and Kevin Love to acquire a pickleball team. His most recent request for an NBA team comes amid a period in which the league is not considering expansion but could begin to do so in the future.

On the Dan Patrick Show in June, Silver said that he was not thinking about adding any teams to the league soon, but if he did, he would consider Las Vegas and Seattle as promising markets.

“There’s no doubt Seattle would be a great market, Las Vegas would be a great market,” Silver said. “There’s state-of-the-art arenas in both those communities.”

Las Vegas has attracted a number of sports leagues in recent years, as the newly formed Golden Knights in the NHL and moving Raiders in the NFL have both settled into the city. Long avoided because of its ties to gambling and other illicit activities, a massive boom in sports gambling seems to have made it a more attractive landing spot.

Because James is currently playing for the Lakers, he is unable to own an interest in an NBA team, and he has repeatedly said that he has no intention of retiring soon. But should the stars align, James’ playing days could end at the dawn of a new expansion in his former league, one in which he could take an owner’s stake.

LeBron James released a statement on social media criticizing the NBA after the league banned Phoenix Suns owner Robert Sarver for one year and fined him $10 million for abusive workplace conduct. James, along with other NBA players, believe that the punishment is not enough.

“I gotta be honest…Our league definitely got this wrong,” James said on Twitter.

As the face of the NBA, James’ dissenting opinion represents a schism between players and management regarding Sarver’s actions. Following a 10-month investigation, the NBA found that Sarver used racist and misogynist language in the workplace as owner of the Suns and Phoenix Mercury, the team’s WNBA counterpart. This included repeated use of the N-word as well as consistent bullying and harassment of female employees.

In 2014, former Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling faced similar allegations and went on to receive a lifetime ban from the sport. But NBA Commissioner Adam Silver has rejected comparisons between Sterling and Sarver, defending the latter owner’s punishment in a press conference Wednesday.

“Let me reiterate: The conduct is indefensible,” Silver said. “But I feel we dealt with it in a fair manner, both taking into account the totality of the circumstances, not just those particular allegations but the 18 years in which Mr. Sarver has owned the Suns and the Mercury.”

Silver also said that while the league’s investigation revealed Sarver’s unacceptable behavior, “there were also many, many people who had very positive things to say about him through this process.”

Though the commissioner was satisfied with the punishment for Sarver, James was one of many players who said it wasn’t enough. Suns star Chris Paul also came forward to criticize the league’s verdict.

“I am of the view that the sanctions fell short in truly addressing what we can all agree was atrocious behavior,” Paul said. “My heart goes out to all of the people that were affected.”

After his punishment was revealed, Sarver said he disagreed with the league’s decision but apologized for his conduct in a statement released through the Suns and Mercury organizations. Following his one-year ban, he will be able to continue as owner of both teams.

NBA commissioner Adam Silver has said that the league has no plans to suspend its season, despite the omicron variant surging.

“No plans right now to pause the season,” Silver said in an interview on NBA Today. “We have of course looked at all the options, but frankly we are having trouble coming up with what the logic would be behind pausing right now.

“As we look through these cases literally ripping through the country, let alone the rest of the world, I think we’re finding ourselves where we sort of knew we were going to get to over the past several months, and that is this virus will not be eradicated, and we’re going to have to learn to live with it. I think that’s what we’re experiencing in the league right now.”

The NBA has had to postpone seven games over the past week due to COVID-19, with omicron “beyond dominant,” according to Silver.

“We’re up around probably 90% of the positive cases we’re seeing right now are omicron,” he said.

The league Sunday sent a memo to teams announcing new rules regarding replacement players; clubs now have more flexibility to add players immediately after losing one to COVID-19 protocols. However, Silver said the league is not yet prepared to change its stance on how long a player must sit out in the wake of a positive test.

“We always are measuring viral loads with our PCR test,” Silver said. “So that’s something, again, that it’s not just our doctors but the medical community is looking at. I think they’re already realizing that you can move away from the 10-day protocol when you have players who are vaccinated and boosted.

“It seems the virus runs through their systems faster. They become not just asymptomatic but, more importantly, they’re not shedding the virus anymore. That’s the real concern in terms of others. And so we are actively looking at shortening the number of days players are out before they can return to the floor.”