Note: This piece has been updated from its original version.
The new NBA calendar means that there will be almost five months between games for NBA players and teams because of the coronavirus pandemic.
What quality of play can we expect when the 2019-20 season restarts on July 30?
We know that the level of play won't be exactly the same after an extended layoff and shortened training camps. We have seen that before when players come back from the offseason and after lockouts in 1998-99 and 2011-12.
On the other hand, we have seen some positive signs during the scrimmage games in Orlando.
Let's look ahead more precisely at what to expect for the remainder of 2019-20.
Offense starts slowly, improves over the season
The clichéd notion that only NBA action can prepare players for NBA games is borne out by the way leaguewide offensive statistics typically start at their lowest point before increasing over the course of the regular season.
Looking at the season's first eight games -- a period equivalent to the "seeding games" that will determine playoff seeding as well as possible play-in matchups for the eighth seed in both conferences -- over the past five seasons, teams have averaged 0.9 fewer points per game than they would the remainder of the schedule.
Because pace typically slows over the course of the season, the change in efficiency is even greater: 2.6 points per 100 team plays. That's driven both by improved shooting and a decrease in turnover rate as the season progresses:
It's impossible to tell from overall statistics whether the increased offense is attributable to a higher level of play on offense or weaker defense, but the slight improvement in free throw shooting between the first eight games and the remainder of the schedule can more safely be considered improved play.
Lockouts closest precedent for restart
The fact that offense suffers early in the regular season indicates that extended layoffs can't be overcome entirely with typical offseason workouts, a full training camp and preseason. This year's restart won't feature any of those benefits, as teams will have abbreviated camps to work back into shape.
To better understand the impact of coming back quickly, it makes sense to look at the post-lockout 1998-99 and 2011-12 seasons as precedent.
It's easy to pick out those two seasons on a chart of NBA offensive ratings over the past two and a half decades.
At the tail end of five years of declining efficiency, the 50-game 1998-99 season marked a nadir for the league offensive rating and the only time teams have averaged less than a point per possession.
While efficiency had trended in a higher direction by the 2011 lockout, the leaguewide offensive rating still dropped 2.7 points per 100 possessions in the 66-game 2011-12 season -- a year-to-year decline exceeded only by that of 1998-99.
Let's zero in on the start of those seasons to see what happened after the extended layoffs and shortened camps:
Intriguingly, the overall drop-off in offense post-lockouts doesn't seem to be driven primarily by unusually slow starts. The improvement in efficiency from the first eight games to the rest of the season was about the same in 1998-99 and 2011-12 as usual, though it's worth noting fatigue was surely a factor later on. Those schedules were compressed and featured more back-to-back games as well as situations where teams played on three consecutive days.
It's also interesting that brief training camps didn't seem to result in exceptional numbers of turnovers early in post-lockout seasons. Instead, the effect of rust is most evident in shooting percentages. The change in free throw percentage from the first eight games to the rest of the regular season was at least double the average of the past five years in both 1998-99 and 2011-12, while 3-point shooting numbers were also down much more than usual.
Perhaps the individual shooting drills currently permitted at NBA training facilities will help offset poor shooting after a layoff, though I suspect those don't entirely replicate the effect of fatigue and more difficult shots from game action -- and the ability for players to access gyms and outdoor courts has varied widely across rosters.
NBA can hope for a gradual return to normal
The history of offenses starting slowly after breaks helps explain why players and the league preferred not to head directly to the playoffs to restart the season. For teams that are relatively locked into their spots, the eight seeding games will serve as something of an extended preseason.
Of course, the results from games early in the normal NBA regular season suggest that alone won't be enough to get shooting back to the levels we usually see later in the schedule. Without the kind of extremely compressed schedule we've seen after lockouts, however, it's possible the level of play will be relatively normal by the later rounds of the postseason.
And of course, given full participation, the level of play should be boosted merely because the playoffs will feature the top half of the league.
We haven't yet discussed the other unusual component of the restart -- games played on neutral courts without fans in attendance. As unusual as that will feel, particularly to viewers at home, I'm skeptical it will actually affect the level of play much. After all, players are used to performing without crowds in practice settings, and it's worth noting that what Michael Jordan famously called "the greatest game I've ever played in" -- a heated Dream Team intersquad scrimmage in Monte Carlo -- happened in an empty gym.
Overall, I think the 2012 playoffs offer a hopeful guide. While efficiency was still down after the lockout, the difference wasn't nearly as pronounced as during the regular season, and that year is remembered more for LeBron James breaking through to win his first championship with the Miami Heat than for poor play. The NBA will hope the same ends up true of the action in Orlando.
Early returns encouraging
With one scrimmage per team in the books, the NBA should be encouraged by the quality of play so far. Despite the long layoff and the number of players who arrived late and are not yet in action, the first three days of scrimmages haven't been exceptionally sloppy.
So far, the offensive rating in scrimmage games has been more efficient than we saw during the 2019 preseason (considering only games between two NBA teams and not those against international opponents), though not nearly as strong as during the regular season. The turnover rate has been nearly as high as we typically see during the preseason, but 2-point shooting has been atypically strong.
Besides turnovers, the other place rust is apparent is in terms of 3-point shooting. We can expect that to improve as players get more reps at game speed.
The NBA's quality of play is still likely to be down somewhat during seeding games, but fears of sloppy play by teams badly out of shape and rhythm haven't come to pass yet.