The Clippers announced that three players have left the bubble for personal reasons. Those being Montrez Harrell, Patrick Beverly and Lou Williams. This is what head coach Doc Rivers had to say about it:
“I think that will be the big thing. I think what the league has learned that teams have already known, it’s more than basketball that comes up. Guys have life going on. Whether it be a family problem, a kid problem, a wife problem, anything, there are issues that come in these guys’ life. We give guys days off all the time because of it. No one really notices it.”
This is a valid point by Doc. Players are given practice off all the time for whatever reasons. Just as any other job when an employee calls out. Now of course anytime someone needs off or to handle something it will be magnified to an infinite amount since they have to leave the bubble to take care of whatever reason it is. Then factor that in with when they comeback they’ll have to quarantine for a few days until testing results are finalized and negative.
If there was a portion of this restart to leave and comeback it would be now. With all these scrimmages going on and the real season still a week away. On top of that 80% of the teams there have already locked up their playoff spot.
Now Lou Williams leaving the bubble was off to a rough start under this microscope last night. He was seen and willingly caught on camera in a Atlanta strip club with I assume a friend of his named jack Harlow who apparently is a rapper, could’ve fooled me.
In a tweet Harlow tried to say was an old pic and he just missed him but he deleted that as well as the IG story from above.
Guilty! The mask Lou is wearing literally only received by players in the bubble. Silly attempt at a cover up.
A very bad optic, left for personal reasons earlier in the day and now at a club? For Lou Williams this should be expected, I mean back in 2014 he ran the personal triangle offense and publicly had two girlfriends at the same time. The NBA’s Hugh Hefner.
Called them Blonde and Brown mostly on social media. Wouldn’t that be annoying having two at once? Hell it’s already a full time job handling on girlfriend and I can’t even get one. Nonetheless money talks you could say.
Before going overboard on that from what we’ve seen today the personal reason seems to be for the passing of Lou’s grandfather.
Obviously a well warranted reason to leave the bubble that’s not a debate. Now it could be said that these players need to hold themselves to a high standard when they leave the bubble and not put themselves in high risk situations for contracting the coronavirus. The reason this could be viewed as selfish even with the self quarantine when he comes back is because if he does test positive he’ll then be out for at least 2 more weeks. Now putting his team at a greater disadvantage when he’s such a valuable piece of the team for something that was entirely avoidable if he just didn’t go out.
Now what can the NBA do to put fear in these guys that leave to be responsible? Not sure. Possibly losing pay for the games that would be missed but you would also have to prove it was contracted through the club. So really it all boils down to how much you care for your team and being safe.
Downtherabbitholesports 
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