NBA Commissioner Adam Silver has deftly taken a side in the ongoing “sit versus play” debate that has become a controversial, decadeslong topic in the league by instituting new rules to load management.

Silver mandated teams to rest no more than one star player per game with the latter defined as someone who has been an All-Star or an AllNBA selection in any of the past three seasons. Teams are also directed to make star players available for nationally televised games and balance the number of one-game rest a star player accrues in home games vs. road games, with a recommendation that a player more often sits at home.

A team’s first violation would carry a fine of $100,000, a $250,000 fine for the second violation and subsequent fines to escalate to $1 million per violation.

Over the past few years, teams would sit healthy players due to load management, even during nationally televised games, which deprived fans from seeing their favorite stars after spending their hard-earned money. This happened several times last year including teams sitting their starters against lesser clubs. Fans are also turned off when they pay television packages and the stars are not around.

On the other side are coaches and front-office personnel who defend load management and cite injury data and analysis to reduce a players’ playing time.

The league, has time and again, noted that these studies are still inconclusive. Silver said that playing too seldom or playing too much lead to the same number of injuries. And injuries, he said, typically don’t increase in frequency or severity as the season progresses, presumably when more rest is needed.

Even before this new mandate, the NBA already took steps to lessen load management by stipulating in the recently concluded collective bargaining agreement that starting this season, players must appear in at least 65 games to be eligible for major awards and honors such as Most Valuable Player, Rookie of the Year, Defensive Player of the Year and AllNBA Teams. These league awards are also connected to contract incentives which can lead to millions of dollars in additional pay.

Personally, I think that the league made a good move in stipulating these new rules since it’s a fine balancing act between the rights of fans and the rights of players, particularly those considered as stars. If you take a look at team rosters, this really only impacts a handful of players who can still take nights off. In Boston for instance, Jayson Tatum can be absent as long as fellow All-Star Jaylen Brown is on the floor.

At the end of the day, the NBA, like any sport, depends on the fan base. And fans troop to the stadiums and tune in to games to watch their favorite superstars. And when they are not on the floor, everything gets diminished.