Not great.

Lakers guard Avery Bradley, who started 44 games this season, won’t go to Orlando for the NBA’s return to play, telling ESPN this:

“As committed to my Lakers teammates and the organization as I am, I ultimately play basketball for my family,” Avery Bradley said. “And so, at a time like this, I can’t imagine making any decision that might put my family’s health and well-being at even the slightest risk.

“As promised also, I will use this time away to focus on the formation of projects to help strengthen my communities.”

Bradley has three children, the oldest of which is a six-year-old son.

Adrian Wojnarowski says the 29-year-old veteran will lose about $650,000 in salary, and reported that the Lakers could sign free agent JR Smith to replace him.

The news is significant for the fact that Bradley is not a fringe player on a bad team. He was averaging 24.2 minutes playing for a title contender and the current #1 seed in the Western Conference. One would understand why Davis Bertans or Trevor Ariza would pull out, since they play for stinky teams and one is a free agent while the other already has a ring. Bradley, however, had a chance to win it all for the first time.

What happens next is likely this:

  1. more players follow Bradley’s lead and opt out
  2. the asterisk applied to Orlando becomes even bigger than it was previously

Hypothetically you could have somebody like Giannis pull out, then the Celtics go to the finals and everybody says, “yeah well it doesn’t matter since the Bucks were missing their best player.” The legitimacy of the return is already being questioned by a lot of people, and it will only get worse as players continue to opt out.