Anthony Edwards Calls Out NBA Players Who Sit Out Regular Season Games: 'You Gotta Play'

It's not just NBA fans who are sick and tired of seeing star players randomly sit out games during the regular season, Minnesota Timberwolves superstar Anthony Edwards is annoyed by the reality as well.

Speaking ahead of this past weekend's NBA All-Star Game, Edwards was asked if he'd like to change anything in the league. Players sitting out games immediately came to the mind of the former Georgia Bulldog.

"Probably just all the guys sitting, resting," Edwards explained. "That’s the only thing I probably don’t like. Just play, man. If you’re 80%, 70 – you gotta play. I don’t like all the sitting, missing games and stuff like that. These people might have enough money to come to one game, you know what I’m saying? That might be the game they come to and then you’re sitting out."

"I take pride in trying to play every game because you never know if there’s one fan that might never seen me play and I’m trying to play." 

Load management around the league has become a very real issue and shows no signs of slowing down.

READ: NBA NEEDS TO PUT EMPHASIS ON VALUING FANS TO COMBAT THE MADDENING LOAD MANAGEMENT TREND AMONG PLAYERS: MATT WILEY

You have superstar players sitting out random regular season games, and more often than not their absence from the lineup isn't announced until very close to tip-off, which as Edwards alluded to, makes the fan experience not live up to expectations.

The only rule set in place to get players on the floor involve nationally televised games. If healthy players sit out nationally televised games during the regular season they will be fined $100,000.

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Mark covers all sports at OutKick while keeping a close eye on the PGA Tour, LIV Golf, and all other happenings in the world of golf. He graduated from the University of Tennessee-Chattanooga before earning his master's degree in journalism from the University of Tennessee. He somehow survived living in Knoxville despite ‘Rocky Top’ being his least favorite song ever written. Before joining OutKick, he wrote for various outlets including SB Nation, The Spun, and BroBible. Mark was also a writer for the Chicago Cubs Double-A affiliate in 2016 when the team won the World Series. He's still waiting for his championship ring to arrive. Follow him on Twitter @itismarkharris.