NBA 65-game rule

It was supposed to be a corrective measure, a line drawn in response to a creeping problem. When the National Basketball Association (NBA) instituted the 65-game rule, the intent was clear: curb load management, restore meaning to the regular season, and ensure that its highest honors were earned both through excellence and presence. And for a time, it seemed reasonable, even necessary. As with many well-intentioned policies, however, it is now being tested at its core.

Consider Cade Cunningham, whose 2025-26 campaign has been both a breakthrough and, increasingly, a cautionary tale. At 61 games played and counting no further due to a collapsed lung, he stands on the verge of disqualification from All-NBA consideration simply because of the rule. The National Basketball Players Association has seized on his case as emblematic of the provision it now terms “arbitrary and overly rigid” based on the evident punishment of circumstance rather than intent. Never mind that it signed off on the implementation as part of the collective bargaining agreement.

The discomfort lies in the contradiction. The rule was designed to address players choosing not to play; Cunningham’s situation, like those of LeBron James, Giannis Antetokounmpo, and Stephen Curry this season, stems from the opposite. And yet the mechanism makes no distinction. It reduces context to a number, and nuance to a threshold. The result is a growing list of elite performers rendered ineligible not by lack of merit, but by the arithmetic of absence.

To be fair, the league did not act blindly. Load management had begun to erode both fan trust and competitive integrity, with star players routinely sitting out marquee matchups. The 65-game minimum, coupled with a requirement of meaningful minutes, was meant to align incentives. And in some respects, it has. Teams think twice now before resting healthy stars; players have more reason to suit up. The regular season, at least superficially, has regained some of its lost urgency.

That said, policy, in sport as in business, is judged not by its intentions, but by its consequences. And in this particular case, the unintended effects are becoming harder to ignore. Players nearing the threshold may feel compelled to return prematurely, risking long-term health for short-term eligibility. Others, like Cunningham, fall just short and find a season’s worth of work effectively chucked by the wayside. The rule, meant to reward commitment, now penalizes prudence.

More troubling is what the turn of events reveals about the league’s definition of “value.” Awards used to balance performance with availability; voters had historically accounted for games played without being bound by it. In contrast, the framework that now prevails removes discretion entirely. It replaces judgment with compliance, turning what was once a qualitative assessment into a binary outcome. In doing so, it narrows the conversation at precisely the moment it should be most expansive.

There is, of course, a path forward. The union is not calling for the abandonment of standards, but for the introduction of context, and specifically exceptions for legitimate injuries. The existing carve-outs, tied to rigid thresholds of their own, have proven insufficient. Reform need not undo the spirit of the rule; it need only recognize that not all absences are created equal.

In the end, the NBA finds itself confronting a familiar dilemma: how to legislate behavior without losing sight of humanity. The 65-game rule arose from frustration and, at least for a while, it served its purpose. As the Cunningham case makes plain, however, the line between discipline and distortion is thinner than it appears. Draw it too firmly, and it ceases to guide. It begins, instead, to obscure.

Anthony L. Cuaycong has been writing Courtside since BusinessWorld introduced a Sports section in 1994. He is a consultant on strategic planning, operations and human resources management, corporate communications, and business development.