NBA Commissioner Adam Silver says league needs 'enforceable' free agency rules

July 10 (UPI) -- NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said he believes the league has "work to do" when it comes to free agency and making sure the league finds more "enforceable" rules to prevent tampering.

Silver told reporters in Las Vegas on Tuesday evening he believes changes will come to free agency in the coming years. Although teams are prohibited from speaking to free agents until free agency begins, multiple noteworthy players verbally agreed to contracts with teams before free agency officially began at 6 p.m. on June 30.

That group includes former Golden State Warriors forward Kevin Durant, who posted a video to Instagram minutes after free agency began announcing he was signing with the Brooklyn Nets.

"My job is to enforce a fair set of rules for all our teams and a set of rules that are clear and make sense for everyone," Silver said. "I think right now we're not quite there. ... The one conviction I have is that we should not have rules that are not strictly enforced."

Silver also said he finds the recent trend of trade requests "disheartening." New Orleans Pelicans star center Anthony Davis requested a trade before February's trade deadline and was sent to the Los Angeles Lakers last month.

Los Angeles Clippers forward Paul George privately asked his former team, the Oklahoma City Thunder, to trade him last week. Both joined teams that made major free agent acquisitions in the last year; Davis will team up with LeBron James, who signed with the Lakers last summer, and George joins newly-signed Kawhi Leonard with the Clippers.

Silver called trade requests "an issue that needs to be addressed."

"You have a contract and it needs to be meaningful on both sides," Silver said. "On one hand, there's an expectation if you have a contract that the team is going to meet the terms of the contract, and the expectation on the other side is the player is going to meet the terms of the contract."