If it wasn’t already a mess, the NBA’s award voting process is about to face another challenge.
As it stands, Luka Dončić is not eligible for postseason awards. However, he intends to appeal that by using the Extraordinary Circumstances Challenge, citing him having to travel Europe for the birth of his child earlier this season.
In his latest piece on Substack, longtime NBA reporter Marc Stein laid out where the complications are going to lie moving forward. Typically, the NBA sends out award voting
electronically on midnight Sunday night/Monday morning after the season ends and gives voters roughly 36 hours before the submission deadline.
At the same time, Luka can not submit his appeal until the season ends. So, both of these can’t happen simultaneously. Voters need to know if Luka is eligible before submitting ballots. As a result, according to Stein, the league will delay voting on awards until after a resolution in Luka’s case.
League rules stipulate that such a challenge can only be filed on the final day of the regular season (April 12 in this case). The league will have to rule on the challenge before releasing it’s electronic ballots to voters, meaning that the voting process might be delayed slightly from its planned April 13-14 window.
The rules in the CBA state that the hearing with an independent expert must take place within two days, the hearing can not last longer than one day and a resolution must come one day later. In short, this will all move pretty fast once the appeal is submitted.
An answer will be had during the week between the regular season and playoffs as to whether Luka will be eligible for awards, so this process won’t drag out into the postseason or beyond.
Again, all of this is but a small silver lining in what likely will end up as a lost season, but at least there remains a realistic chance that Luka could still get the rightful credit for his brilliant performance this year.
You can follow Jacob on Twitter at @JacobRude or on Bluesky at @jacobrude.bsky.social.
