What We've Learned About Donald Trump's Call With Adam Silver & Others

On Saturday, President Donald Trump scheduled a conference call to be held, involving all major sports commissioners in the United States of America. As all major sports across the country are currently on hold due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the President wanted to bounce around some ideas for if/when sports return in 2020.

The NBA was the first league to suspend the season back on March 11th. Since their move, all others followed. Now, at this point, not a single sports league has a date set for a return. Although the NBA vowed to take a guaranteed 30-day break, there doesn't seem to be any intention of coming back by that time. 

In fact, the NBA seems to be gearing up for a June or July return, if that. Before Trump's conference call on Saturday, ESPN's Brian Windhorst's latest report indicated that the NBA could be "angling" towards canceling the 2020 season.

But after Saturday afternoon's conference call, there could be a little bit of optimism for the return of the NBA. President Trump not only believes the NFL could be back in action on time in September, but he also mentioned that he "hopes" to have fans in the stands as early as August, according to ESPN.

Right now, we are under the belief that if/when the NBA returns, all games will be held at a neutral arena with no fans in attendance. But if Trump's prediction is accurate, there could be a chance the NBA's playoff/finals matchups could allow fans to attend if the season does eventually resume. Right now, though, there's just optimism -- not a certainty.

It seems things are trending in the right direction after some negative news regarding the return of the NBA came about on Friday night. But at this point, it's still too early to tell whether sports -- more specifically, the NBA -- can resume this year or not. 

Justin Grasso covers the Philadelphia 76ers for Sports Illustrated. You can follow him on Twitter: @JGrasso_