The Bulls will get some practice time before they play the Los Angeles Lakers on Sunday night if the team is cleared by the NBA in the next few days.
The Bulls have not been together as a team since Monday morning, just before the league postponed their two games this week due to a COVID-19 outbreak that had landed 10 players in health and safety protocols.
The NBA's decision to delay the Detroit Pistons and Toronto Raptors games has not resulted in any new cases of carbon dioxide on the team's roster or coaching staff.
The practice facility in Chicago has been mostly inactive this week except for players who are testing for COVID-19 or completing rehab assignments.
"We haven't been able to do anything at all," he said during the call. The league came out with some protocols that we needed to follow after the games were postponed.
We haven't been able to do any of the activities that we could have done. I'm hoping that the league will give us some time here, Friday and Saturday, to get the group back together, so that we can play on Sunday.
Two players, Coby White and Javonte Green, have cleared protocols and have been in the team facility this week for individual workouts. Both should be able to play in Sunday's game. The three players will be out of the isolation period by Sunday, but they won't be back on the court until next week.
The players who tested positive most recently were out until after Christmas.
If a player returns multiple negative tests in a 24 hour period, they must miss at least 10 days.
"We've had a lot of guys who have not really experienced any illness or sickness, but I still think there's a period where they've got to deal with the medical staff and the league in terms of what they can and cannot."
The Bulls are hoping they are on the other side of this team outbreak that decimated their roster since White tested positive. The team should have at least 10 players available for Sunday's game.
The break in action this week will allow the players that were logging a lot of minutes to rest.
As of early November, the Bulls were fully vaccined. Some players have received booster shots, but they don't know how many.
The Bulls have been testing daily since their first positive was triggered by the NBA after the Thanksgiving holiday. The team felt that it was being put at a competitive disadvantage because of the large portion of its roster out.
"I think the league is trying to do everything it can to keep teams safe and healthy, and that's what it's trying to do," he said. I don't know what the right number is to say this team should play or not. We lost a lot of players because of this. The other teams have been hit a bit. When you lose key players on your team, it definitely affects you.
The league is probably in the process of figuring out how they're going to test everybody else in the league with the surge that's going on right now. More guys are going to test positive when you do more testing like that.
Sixty players have entered the protocols this season, including 43 in December.
