When the NBA suspended its season abruptly, the world took notice. “We were in the position to be the first U.S. business with our level of visibility to cease operations,” says Weiss, a former geography major who manages the league’s player health group and was part of the team that made the March 11 decision. “With our hundreds of employees in China, the coronavirus was an issue that we had been tracking.” The senior VP had sent a memo to all teams on January 31 to promote awareness and preliminary preventive measures regarding the virus. Weiss, who says his height (“I was 5-foot-nothing when I started high school”) kept him off the hardwood, now helps communicate with teams every day as the league—like the rest of us—awaits an end to the corona hiatus. “The NBA will continue to work with the Centers for Disease Control and other experts to understand when it is safe to come back,” he says.