ORLANDO, Fla. — Golden State Warriors coach Steve Kerr said he’s “very concerned” that the NBA’s increased pace of play combined with its condensed 82-game schedule is leading to an increase in soft tissue injuries.
In the last two days, Milwaukee Bucks forward Giannis Antetokounmpo suffered a groin strain wihle the San Antonio Spurs announced that center Victor Wembanyama has a left calf strain and guard Stephon Castle has a hip flexor strain.
Five other NBA players are also currently out with calf strains: Anthony Davis, Ty Jerome, Dylan Harper, Ja Morant and Jrue Holiday.
“[The Warriors’ medical staff] believes that the wear and tear, the speed, the pace, the mileage is factoring into these injuries,” Kerr said.
According to ESPN Research, the league is playing at its fastest average collective pace since the 1988-89 season.
“Across the league, everyone understands that it’s easier to score if you beat the opponent down the floor, get out in transition,” Kerr said. “But when everybody’s doing that, the games are much higher-paced. Everyone has to cover out to 25 feet because everybody can shoot 3s. We have all the data. Players are running faster and further [than] before. We’re trying to do the best we can, but we basically have a game every other night. It’s not an easy thing to do.”
Kerr has been a vocal proponent of shortening the NBA schedule from 82 games to 72 or fewer, believing that bit of extra rest and practice time over the course of several months would pay dividends.
“We literally haven’t had a single practice on this road trip,” Kerr said. “Not one. We’ve been gone a week or longer. Eight days, not one practice. It’s just game, game, game. So not only is there no recovery time, there’s no practice time. What was different was back in the day, you did have four [games] in five nights, which was not great, but then you’d have four days between games. You’d take a day off and have a couple good practices.”
The Warriors are already on their fifth back-to-back in the first month, playing in Orlando on Tuesday night and in Miami on Wednesday night to close out a six-game road trip. After the Miami game, they’ll have played a league-high 17 games in 29 days across 12 cities.
But Kerr voiced skepticism that the league would seriously look at reducing the schedule due to the financial implications.
“The tricky part is all the constituents would have to agree to take less revenue,” Kerr said. “In 2025 in America, good luck in any industry. Imagine some big company saying, ‘You know what, we’re not as concerned about our stock price. We’re actually concerned with employing people and giving people a stable job and making our product better.’ That’s not happening. You know that.”
