The Pistons vs. Bulls game scheduled for December 14 has been postponed by the NBA, according to Adrian Wojnarowski.
The Chicago Department of Public Health had concerns about the Bulls continuing to play this week, and that played a part in the NBA decision, sources tell ESPN.
— Adrian Wojnarowski (@wojespn) December 13, 2021
After Alize Johnson, the 10th player for the Bulls to enter Health and Safety protocols, tested positive on Monday morning, it was looking more and more likely that this would be the case.
The NBA is also postponing the Bulls game against the Raptors on Thursday. I would assume there could be more coming if the Bulls are not able to get the COVID outbreak under control and start getting some players back from the protocols.
The protocols require vaccinated players to quarantine for 10 days unless they receive two negative tests in a row.
A short-handed Bulls team playing with only 8 players would have been a good opportunity for the Pistons to put an end to their 12 game losing streak. Especially since both DeMar DeRozan and Zach LaVine were on the list of 10 players in the protocols.
However, as noted in the tweets by Woj, the Chicago Department of Public Health had concerns about the Bulls playing this week, and the health and safety of the players and public will always take priority.
The Pistons will now get an extra long break as their next game won’t be until Thursday against the Indiana Pacers in Indianapolis.
After dealing with quite a few postponed games last season, this is the first such instance of a postponed game in the NBA this season. We made it through more than a quarter of the season before it happened, which is an improvement over last season.
The Pistons have stayed relatively unscathed in terms of positive COVID cases the last couple seasons, so avoiding playing the Bulls after a huge outbreak amongst the team is a good thing for them.