Who Should Take NBA Coronavirus Rules Seriously After James Harden Wrist Slap?

PORTLAND, Ore. — Just under the wire of the new year, the Houston Rockets and Portland Trail Blazers played the defining NBA game of 2020.

It was supposed to be both teams' second game of the young season; it was the Rockets' first, because their would-be opener Wednesday against the Oklahoma City Thunder was postponed because of positive COVID-19 tests and contact tracing leaving them without the minimum of eight available players. They only got to nine Saturday because the league opted not to suspend James Harden for violating the safety protocols in an effort to get himself traded.

NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said in a Thursday interview on ESPN's The Jump the league didn't suspend Harden for the latest video because "it's Christmas" and "it was a first offense," which both suggests that the coronavirus takes holidays off and that every player will get one free pass to blow off the 150-plus pages of rules the league put in place to prevent exactly what the Rockets have had to deal with for the past week.

It all begs the question of what, exactly, we're doing here.

The NBA opted not to play this season in another bubble because nobody—not the league office, not the team governors, not the players—wanted another bubble. The summer's wildly successful Disney World experiment cost the league in the neighborhood of $150 million, and players spoke openly about the mental toll of being away from their families for the three months they spent in Florida.

Which is fine enough, if the league and players are going to be serious about taking the same precautions the rest of society has been asked to take since March. For all the goodwill Silver has built up this year as the sports commissioner who stepped up and led in the response to an unprecedented public health crisis—first by shutting the NBA down in March and then by pulling off the bubble without any positive COVID-19 tests—the league's approach to an unbubbled season thus far has been similar to the NFL and Major League Baseball model of crossing their fingers and hoping for the best.

And so the Rockets' Saturday overtime loss in Portland came against the twin backdrops of a superstar vocally trying to force his way out of town and a stark reminder of just how precarious a position the league is in trying to play this season outside of a bubble.

Steve Dykes/Associated Press

Before opening week, the Harden saga was something that mostly played out on Twitter and in training camp, when a star player repeatedly showing up on video at clubs with no mask on during a pandemic instead of at practice can be hand-waved away as a chemistry issue to be worked through as a team. Harden's debut in Portland gave some idea of how this all is going to go during the season.

Early indications are that Harden, his teammates and first-time head coach Stephen Silas want to act like nothing out of the ordinary is happening, either with Harden's open desire to play elsewhere or with nearly half the team currently in the league's health and safety protocol.

Here's Harden, asked at Saturday morning's shootaround for his thoughts on the NBA's laughable $50,000 fine and the four-day quarantine he had to clear before suiting up in Portland: "Year 12 for me. I'm excited to be out here playing. You never want to take playing basketball for granted."

The Harden who took the floor in Portland looked a lot like the guy who led the league in scoring the past three seasons and won the 2017-18 MVP award, despite the lack of a training camp. He hit his unguardable stepback threes, got to the rim and free-throw line at will and ran the offense like he always does, reminding the world, and any team that may or may not be interested in trading for him, why he's worth putting up with his past month of activity.

Steve Dykes/Associated Press

The part left unsaid, of course, is that Harden's last month of activity is making the NBA's already herculean task of pulling off this season even harder. The league ruled Harden ineligible to play in the game against the Thunder that was ultimately postponed; had that game been played, he would have lost $567,000 in salary.

Quarantining the negative-testing John Wall and DeMarcus Cousins for seven days (they'll be out Monday night in Denver and make their Rockets debuts at home Thursday) for contact tracing while letting Harden go to clubs maskless with a slap on the wrist is tough to understand.

Star players get preferential treatment in every organization in the NBA. But if this season is going to get finished, Harden's ability to create his own set of personal safety guidelines can't be treated like Paul George and Kawhi Leonard making the Clippers' practice schedule, or Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving hashing out the finer points of the Nets offense on Instagram Live.

Harden's teammate, Danuel House Jr., got kicked out of the bubble for less than what Harden has made sure everyone sees on video to make it untenable for Houston to keep him.

House was one of the nine Rockets players who took the floor Saturday and one of five who played upward of 35 minutes, and that's going to be the case until the rest of Houston's players are cleared to return. It's also a safe bet the Rockets won't be the only team this happens to.

Silver is paying lip service to doing the best he can to patch together a season while holding different players to different standards. Harden is at once doing the best he can to remind the Rockets why they need to trade him soon and to remind other teams why, despite everything, they need to get on the phone with general manager Rafael Stone to get a deal done.

The NBA wanted a season played in empty arenas to be defined by its ingenuity in combating the coronavirus and the rise of a loaded and exciting crop of up-and-coming stars. What we're getting is a season defined by James Harden.

Sean Highkin covers the NBA for Bleacher Report. He is a graduate of the University of Oregon and lives in Portland. His work has been honored by the Pro Basketball Writers' Association. Follow him on Twitter, Instagram and in the B/R App.