NBA Will Pay Players Full Paychecks on April 15 Amid COVID-19 Pandemic

NBA teams will pay players their full paychecks on April 15, the league announced in a memo Thursday. 

ESPN's Adrian Wojnarowski reported the NBA and NBPA could not come to an agreement on withholding a percentage of player checks in an escrow account to protect against games being canceled amid the coronavirus pandemic. Negotiations are expected to continue before May 1 checks come for the players.

The NBA indefinitely postponed its season last month after Utah Jazz center Rudy Gobert tested positive for COVID-19. Nearly every other major sports league worldwide has since ceased operations, and there is no clear timetable for sports to return. 

In the event the 2019-20 NBA season does resume, it's considered unlikely that fans would be allowed in attendance. The league has discussed multiple contingency plans for continuing the season, including a centralized location in Las Vegas.

However, it seems almost certain at this point that the NBA will be forced to cancel at least some regular-season games—a maneuver that would automatically trigger the force majeure clause in the collective bargaining agreement. Players would lose one percent of their salary for each canceled game, per the CBA. Most teams had about 65 games played at the time of the season's postponement.

In the event of canceled games, players would be forced to pay back salary they received over their allotted percentage. If a player is unable to pay that money back, it would be taken out of their wages for the following season.

The NBA holds 10 percent of player salaries in an escrow account already, so the amount players would have to pay back would ultimately be determined by the league's accounting when the 2019-20 season ends or is canceled. Most of the lost revenue would come from paying back television partners that would not receive the amount of games agreed upon in their contracts. Other factors, like ticket sales and concessions, would also be lost but take up a far lesser slice of the revenue pie.

The NBA appears nowhere near the formal cancellation of games, so a negotiation may be the best thing for all parties to avoid a financial fiasco next season.