Rick Bowmer/Associated Press
The Toronto Raptors are off to Florida.
According to Doug Smith of the Toronto Star, the team traveled to Fort Myers on Monday in preparation for a restart to the 2019-20 season. They’ll open with “COVID-19 testing and individual workouts this week.”
The team noted in a press release: “In keeping with NBA and team safety protocols, there will be no group workouts during this phase of return to play, and strict protocols have been designed to ensure this initial level of access will take place in a safe, controlled and healthy way.”
Whether the NBA season will resume remains a question. A group of players, led by Kyrie Irving and Avery Bradley, have expressed concerns that a return to play could distract from the marches and gatherings happening around the United States and the world in protest of systemic racism and police brutality.
According to Malika Andrews and Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN, those players also want to see the NBA undertake a number of changes, including improving “hiring practices for black front-office and head-coaching candidates—making it so the league’s management better reflects its composition of players; donations to organizations serving black communities; and partnerships with black-owned businesses and arena vendors.”
But there are also concerns regarding the COVID-19 pandemic to take into consideration, especially with the 22-team restart happening in Orlando. Florida exceeded 100,000 total coronavirus cases Sunday, with a record-high of over 4,000 cases reported Saturday.
And there are injury concerns as well given the long and unusual layoff. On Monday, Wojnarowski reported that Washington Wizards forward Davis Bertans would be skipping the return to play as a “preventive measure.”
Bertans had two ACL tears before his NBA career began.
But the Raptors, at least, are operating as though the restart will begin on time. The defending champions sit at 46-18, second in the Eastern Conference, and are a real threat to repeat behind Pascal Siakam and Kyle Lowry.
