Coming off an 18-month stretch that included postseason play inside a single-site bubble, extended isolation from friends and family, an abundance of injuries that were (somewhat) brought on by an atypically tight regular-season schedule and shortened offseason, dozens of players either contracting COVID-19 themselves or being held out of games and practice due to the league’s necessarily harsh health and safety protocols, NBA teams had a difficult time weighing what was real against what might not be sustainable in a normal environment.
These unprecedented factors made this offseason such a difficult one to participate in, let alone analyze from afar.