After long upholding the value of the NBA schedule as it’s existed for years, NBA Commissioner Adam Silver now says there’s “nothing magical” about an 82-game calendar. (Getty Images)

Player fatigue has become a major topic of research, study and conversation in the NBA in recent years. Players, analysts and media members have all gone deep on the impact that playing multiple high-level basketball games each week in multiple cities — and often, in multiple time zones — can have on players’ in-game effectiveness and the overall health of their bodies over the course of a season that can stretch from October through June.

But while the league has altered its schedule in an attempt to reduce strain and increase rest — and, y’know, the likelihood that big-name players don’t get “DNP-rested” during marquee nationally televised games anymore — NBA Commissioner Adam Silver has held firm to the notion that, while there’s some room for tweaks, the NBA regular season should remain 82 games long, as it’s been since 1967-68.

That stance might be changing.

During a chat with Sam Amick of USA TODAY Sports ahead of the preseason Global Games China exhibitions between the Golden State Warriors and Minnesota Timberwolves, Silver talked about the great and ever-increasing appetite for the NBA product abroad, and the league’s longstanding interest in eventually developing franchises outside of North America. This discussion has come up every year since before Silver succeeded David Stern. First, the sitting boss talks up teams (or All-Star Games, or tournaments) in Europe, China or Mexico City as the league’s destiny. Then, he notes the logistical challenges associated with trying to jam double-digit-hour international travel into the NBA calendar as currently constructed, and tables the issue for another day.

While the possibility that eventual expansion would include a franchise in Mexico City (or across an ocean, with an assist from a Supersonic Flight Option to Be Named Later) is intriguing, the more tantalizing here-and-now issue is what Silver said about the construction of that NBA calendar (emphasis mine):

“We can play games in China and Europe, or occasional preseason games as a one-off, but under existing airline technology, the planes aren’t fast enough to at least play in the current framework of our regular season,” Silver, who did not attend Thursday’s game but plans on attending the Warriors-Wolves preseason game in Shanghai on Sunday, said by phone. “(But) it may be something we’ll be looking at over the coming years, is what a regular season schedule look like a decade from now.”

The premise, of course, is that an 82-game schedule would likely be too taxing if there was intercontinental travel added to the schedule.

“There’s nothing magical about 82 games,” Silver continued. “It’s been in place for 50 years, but for the long-term planning of the league, as we learn more about the human body and the wear and tear of travel and the competitive landscape … invariably we’ll look at the regular season. And in looking at the regular season, it may create more opportunities for international franchises.”

It’d be too strong to call it a reversal of course, but desanctifying the 82-game season would seem to represent something of a shift for the league office.

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The NBA played a 66-game slate in the lockout-shortened 2011-12 season, tipping off on Christmas Day — which has become a showcase event for the league over the years, something of an unofficial starting point for casual fans to begin paying attention — and wrapping up in late April. Before the start of the 2012 postseason, the league trumpeted increased ratings and roughly similar attendance figures for the shortened season. Even so, Silver, then deputy commissioner, said he saw no future for anything less than 82 games:

“If you cut the season shorter, we cut our revenues significantly as well. Players would make less, so no, and I think it’s not optimal to play a condensed season in this fashion,” he said Thursday.

“I think both we and the players’ union recognized that going in, but it was a compromise on both our parts to maximize the amount of salary players would get this season and to have as authentic a season as possible, sufficient number of games for competitive reasons.”

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