LeBron James Wants Fewer Games to Protect Players

The NBA is experimenting with a 44-minute game, but LeBron James doesn’t think that will help protect players.

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The NBA announced that it will be experimenting with a 44-minute game, using the Boston Celtics vs Brooklyn Nets preseason game on Oct. 19 as a test case.

While the idea of shortening games is an interesting one, already we’ve seen big names in the league dismiss the idea. Dallas Mavericks star Dirk Nowitzki says he thinks the NBA should trim the season from 82 games to 60-ish and Miami Heat coach Erik Spoelstra agreed that the NBA needs to reduce games, not minutes.

LeBron James also wants a shorter season, and doesn’t think reducing minutes will help.

LeBron: "The minutes doesn’t mean anything. We can play 50-minute games if we had to. It’s just the games."
— Dave McMenamin (@mcten) October 15, 2014

LeBron James: "We want to protect the prize and the prize is the players"
— Dave McMenamin (@mcten) October 15, 2014

LeBron: "We have to continue to promote the game ... If guys are injured cuz there are so many games, we can’t promote it at a high level"
— Dave McMenamin (@mcten) October 15, 2014

LeBron: "I know the lockout year the 66-game season was really good but we had to squeeze in a lot of games because we had lost (time)"
— Dave McMenamin (@mcten) October 15, 2014

James echoes the same sentiments as his old coach and Nowitzki, and 60-something games seems to be the agreed-upon number. However, the NBA just signed a major TV deal and the networks surely expect a certain amount of inventory. Maybe that’s why the league is experimenting with reducing minutes rather than games.

Four fewer minutes a game (from 48 minutes to 44), over the span of 82 games, is 328 minutes. Or nearly seven-and-a-half games under the new minutes and 6.8 games under a 48-minute game. That’s like cutting the season from 82 to roughly 75 games.

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