Steve Kerr wants big changes to NBA schedule

After a series of injuries at the start of the 2025/26 NBA season, one of the league’s most illustrious names has expressed his concern about the schedule.

In recent days Milwaukee Bucks forward Giannis Antetokounmpo has suffered a groin strain, while San Antonio Spurs duo Victor Wembanyama and Stephon Castle have also been sidelined with strain injuries. In addition, other big names like Anthony Davis, Ty Jerome, Dylan Harper, Ja Morant and Jrue Holiday are all out with calf strains.

Speaking this week Golden State Warriors head coach Steve Kerr has expressed concern about player safety. He revealed that the Warriors medical team “believes that the wear and tear, the speed, the pace, the mileage is factoring into these injuries.”

“Across the league, everyone understands that it’s easier to score if you beat the opponent down the floor, get out in transition,” Kerr said. “But when everybody’s doing that, the games are much higher-paced. Everyone has to cover out to 25 feet because everybody can shoot 3s. We have all the data. Players are running faster and further [than] before. We’re trying to do the best we can, but we basically have a game every other night. It’s not an easy thing to do.”

Kerr is a nine-time NBA champion, with five championship rings as a player and four as a head coach. Kerr has been a vocal proponent of shortening the NBA season to give players extra rest and give teams more time to practice.

He revealed that he has not been able to hold a single practice session with his team for the past eight days, owing to a long stretch of road games.

“It’s just game, game, game. So not only is there no recovery time, there’s no practice time. What was different was back in the day, you did have four [games] in five nights, which was not great, but then you’d have four days between games. You’d take a day off and have a couple good practices.”

However Kerr conceded that the league was unlikely to reduce the number of games that teams play, pointing to the financial implications. However if big players are regularly ruled out of key games due to injury, fans may start to push for changes to the schedule.

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