After four months of waiting and planning, the NBA bubble is ready to be tested.
The first six teams – the Brooklyn Nets, Denver Nuggets, Orlando Magic, Phoenix Suns, Utah Jazz and Washington Wizards – are scheduled to arrive Tuesday at the Walt Disney World Resort near Orlando, Florida. Another eight teams arrive Wednesday, the last eight arrive Thursday, and with that training camps will be on the cusp of beginning.
If the plan works, all teams will be at Disney for at least 5 1/2 weeks, and some teams will be there for more than three months. Not everyone in the league, though, has an abundance of optimism that the experiment – involving daily testing, separation from friends and family for weeks if not months, and strict regulations regarding just about everything imaginable while inside the bubble – will be enough to complete the season.
“I’m not very confident,” New Orleans Pelicans guard Brandon Ingram said. “But they’ve got us going so we’ll see.”
The process for arrivals will be streamlined: Players and team staff will be immediately taken to the testing room at their hotel after clearing security when arriving on the premises. They’ll receive a short briefing on the testing program and other matters, receive what will serve as their room key, then go through initial testing for both the coronavirus and the presence of antibodies. Virus testing will continue daily; the antibody testing is intended to be a one-time event in Florida.