ESPN's Stephen A. Smith said Tuesday he believes the NBA will return in early July, and the league has discussed a potential play-in tournament for the last two seeds in each conference.

Smith made his comments based on conversations with players, executives and agents around the league, all of whom are motivated to finish the 2019-20 season—provided there is not another spike in coronavirus cases around the country.

The NBA has maintained it will heed the advice of medical professionals when deciding whether to resume the season.

NBA Commissioner Adam Silver told Turner Sports' Ernie Johnson (via Sports Illustrated) the league has had several discussions but made no formal decisions on any course of action. 

"Honestly, we haven't made any decisions," Silver said April 6. "In a perfect world, yes, we would try to finish the regular season in some form and then move onto the playoffs. But what I've learned, I think initially, the first week, first two weeks, we were looking at more specific scenarios. If we start this date, what would that mean for the regular season? When would the playoffs begin? When would they conclude? Again, what I've learned over the last few weeks is that we just have too little information to make those sort of projections."

The NBA announced Monday that it will not be opening up team facilities until at least May 8. Facilities will only be opened in states where stay-at-home orders have been lifted. Teams will be limited to only four players in the facility at any time, and there is not to be group work. It's unclear if the ban on team facilities will actually be lifted at that time given some teams have raised concerns about the safety of players and staff.

"We are going to wait and see what happens in the state over the couple weeks," Hawks president of basketball operations and general manager Travis Schlenk told ESPN's Adrian Wojnarowski. "If there's a positive response, we'll slowly open up. If it's a negative response, we'll make sure our staff and players remain healthy."

Any type of play-in tournament or resumption of the regular season or playoffs is likely months away. The NBA would have to allow players time to get back into shape, work with their teammates and figure out exactly how many games will be canceled due to the pandemic. That's all without figuring out where these games will be played.