Silver plays down load management, “I don’t have a good answer” for fan frustration

SALT LAKE CITY — Stephen Curry was voted an All-Star but is out of Sunday’s showcase game due to a left leg injury. Kevin Durant (knee) and Zion Williamson (hamstring) are both out as well (although Zion is in Salt Lake City doing promotional work).

Beyond that trio, the list of All-Stars who have missed at least 10 games this season is long: LeBron James, Giannis Antetokounmpo (who has a wrist injury that could limit his minutes on Sunday), Luka Dončić, Joel Embiid, Kyrie Irving, and Jaren Jackson Jr.

While many of those missed games are due to legitimate injuries, star players missing games and load management — seeming to devalue the regular season — have become hot topics around the league.

“I understand it from a fan standpoint that if you are particularly buying tickets to a particular game and that player isn’t playing. I don’t have a good answer for that other than this is a deep league with incredible competition,” NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said in his annual All-Star weekend press conference. “But the mindset of our teams and players these days… is that they should be optimizing performance for the playoffs. The difficulty is fans of that team, of those teams, want them to do that as well.”

The NBA and its player’s union — deep in negotiations on a new Collective Bargaining Agreement — are discussing the issue. There have been reports the NBA could tie eligibility for postseason awards such as MVP or Defensive Player of the Year to games played.

“It’s something that I don’t think we’re approaching in an adversarial way with the players association,” Silver said. “We’re working collectively, together with our doctors, our data scientists, and trying to see if there’s an optimal way for player performance. If