The NBA All-Star Weekend is always one of the most anticipated events in the NBA calendar year. The Celebrity game and the Rising Stars Challenge kick-off the weekend on Friday, while Saturday's festivities include the Skills Challenge, the Three-Point Shootout, and the Slam Dunk Contest. Last but not least would be the main event of the weekend, which is the actual All-Star Game featuring 24 of the best players in the NBA.
Aside from it being a showcase of talent, it is also a time when players can take a break from the daily grind of the NBA season. In addition, and more importantly, it is also a time when fans get to interact with the very same stars they look up to on the basketball court.
Despite the huge success of NBA All-Star Weekend over the years, it still has some flaws. Here are some ways to tweak and fix the NBA All-Star weekend.
All-Star Game – Eliminate Conferences Completely and Playground Style Draft
One of the major problems that the weekend faced in recent years is that the actual All-Star game isn't competitive. The elimination of conferences, the incorporation of team captains, and a draft-style selection of rosters addressed that concern last season. The 2018 All-Star game came down to the wire, and this excitement is what fans came to see aside from all the highlight dunks, crossovers, and long bombs.
This year, the NBA listened to its fans when they called for the draft to be televised. Next year, let's hope the NBA actually kicks off the weekend with a the live draft, where the captains select their roster on the fly play-ground style. Sure, it was fun seeing captains LeBron and Giannis pick their roster on live television. But it would be more fun if they'd do it on the court or on a stage, with rest of the field of All-Stars lined-up.
In addition to this little wrinkle, we have to tweak the actual selection of the All-Star pool. Yes, the game no longer features the traditional East versus West. But the NBA continues to select twelve players from each conference.
The Western Conference has always been more loaded with talent over the years. And this year, it was pretty tough to fill out a 12-man roster of players from the East. I'd argue that All-Star snubs like Rudy Gobert and even rookie sensation Luka Doncic deserve to be in the game ahead of some of those selected in the East. Thus, the NBA should really consider taking the next step, and just select the 24 best (or most popular) players in the league.
Three-Point Shootout on the Main Event
The Slam Dunk contest has always come on last as the main event of All-Star Saturday, and is always preceeded by the Three-point shootout.
But in an era where shooting threes is the in thing, the NBA should consider interchanging both competitions' positions on the card, and have the long-ball shootout as the main event of the evening.
The Slam Dunk contest has, more often than not, left fans disappointed with the overall performance of the dunkers.
Sure, the entertainment upside of the dunk contest is arguably much higher than that of the three-point shootout. When the dunk contest is good, it's going to be memorable. Just like the legendary Vince Carter performance in 2000 or the 2016 showdown between Aaron Gordon and Zach Lavine.
But when the contest falls flat and fails to live up to the hype, fans will always compare them to the legendary performances of the past.
The three-point shootout, on the other hand, has consistently been more entertaining over the past years. Fans “ooh” and “ahh” over the sight of a Steph Curry or a Klay Thompson or even a Joe “Cool” Harris catching fire and knocking down ten straight from deep.
Competitors in the three-point contest have been a lot more consistent in putting up stellar shooting numbers. The 2019 edition that saw Joe Harris take home the crown really gave fans their money's worth.
With the three-point revolution in full swing, it's also more than likely that we'll get a better showing from the contest participants since this is basically what they do on a daily basis. Whereas dunk contest participants don't really practice their creative dunks regularly.
With all these factors, the NBA should give the shooters a chance to main event the big stage of NBA All-Star Saturday night.
Scrap the Celebrity Game, Let's have a Throwback Game
The Celebrity Game just isn't cutting it. Sure it adds publicity to have some high-profile actors, politicians, and musicians showing off their skills on the court. And yes, some former players even suit up for this kick-off contest. But it just seems to fly by, like some sort of pre-show game before the actual Friday night showcase of the Rising Stars challenge.
Why not feature some retired NBA stars to go at each other to kick-off All-Star weekend, instead? The NBA already tried this gimmick game back in the 1980s to the early 90s. However, they got rid of it due to players suffering injuries during the exhibition.
But then again, the Big 3 is a huge hit, and most of the players there go hard in the half-court tournament. Moreover, fans would be more interested to see legends like Kobe Bryant and Allen Iverson go at it for old times sake, that is if they agree to join the contest.
But again, considering the success of The Big 3, it shouldn't be too hard to get former NBA stars and players to sign up for this kick-off game.
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