A Simple Idea For Reinventing The NBA All-Star Game

As the years pass, public approval of the NBA All-Star Weekend continuously falls. The ‘why’ is more nuanced than most care to believe which is fair given how low the stakes are for most involved parties. With that said a sizable portion of that ‘why’ has implications across the entirety of the NBA’s evolution throughout its history. The crux of this lies within the relationship that art has with the science of the sport.

Much of winning in the NBA was traditionally attributed to a mastering of the science of team basketball. This led to rigid ideas on how to train serious players, implying a line in the sand between what was conventionally considered ‘street ball’ and ‘league ball’. Without going too deep into the finer points of that history, after which more than enough cliche sports movies have been modeled (Glory Road FTW!), the trend over the last ~three decades has seen the league shift from a majority of technicians to artists through the emergence of a fusion of street and league training.

It’s a bit open-ended to simply say players have gotten better, though this is also true. The effect that having a league full of artists has had on the product is wide-ranging and directly related to the information/social media boom of the last two decades. Today’s players and teams have a greater opportunity cost than yesterday’s by not appearing relatable, marketable, and unique. The spacial revolution of the game has also conveniently created a greater demand for players who can create space and shoot from anywhere, two skills that were previously coveted on the street more than in the gym.

This largely sums up why league ratings have gone up as All-Star ratings have dropped. In short, the NBA has turned the regular season into one large All-Star game through a combination of the evolution of its players, the way the game is legislated through league officiating, and the demand/medium used by the fans who digest NBA content. The sort of highlights fans used to rave about like T-Mac throwing it off the backboard to himself, and Jason Williams’ behind-the-back elbow pass happen on almost a nightly basis in today’s NBA. How could fans not be desensitized to that sort of flair and flashiness when it’s readily available at their fingertips whenever they’re ready to consume, and new content flows in at an unprecedented rate?

The one consumption variable of NBA basketball that’s effect hasn’t changed over time is competition. Stereotypically, old fans complain about the modern game being too flashy and not physical enough, while young fans want the game to be faster, flashier, and more innovative. The one element of modern basketball that neither group can deny loving is good, old-fashioned competition. With that said, competition should be the primary focus of those in charge of the NBA All-Star game. The simple question needed to be asked by the league is, how do we give ourselves the best chance to create a game that’s consistently competitive year in and year out?

Here’s an idea.

1. Scratch the fan vote. It’s relatively useless as fans care more about the quality of the game than who’s actually in it, so long as it’s filled with the legitimate elite players in the league. Instead, make it purely player/coach-based. Players and coaches vote for the best forty players in the league. Forty players means adding sixteen players to the game, so it’s highly unlikely fans will miss their favorite player in this one.
2. The top eight players who receive the most votes become captains and are randomly assigned a pick order. They pick teams snake draft style until all forty players are designated to a team so that there are now eight teams of five players.
3. Seeds are drawn at random. All scoring is 1 & 2 pointers. Single-game elimination. Games are played one at a time and in the first round games are played up to 10, the second round games to 15, and the final to 21. The winning team takes home a split prize of $1,000,000, and an additional million donated to a charity of the winning team captain’s choice.

The basic gist is to create as much competition as possible. With teams starting their all-star appearance only 10 points away from elimination, rather than going through three-quarters of mundanity where they’ve effectively reduced the game to a half-court shooting contest, players will be faced with either playing competitively or being embarrassed in the first round.

Additionally, the fast-paced tournament style of games will create a segmented style where commercial breaks don’t interrupt the actual games (soccer style). So it’s a win for the viewer who wants to sit and watch an entire sequence of basketball played through, and for the cable companies who need their ad revenue regardless.

Lastly, this format will create an opportunity for the players who truly care about being there to carve out a name for themselves in the history of the game. Effort levels have become a serious issue at the All-Star game, and it’s become a trend for it to be abundantly clear early in the game which players are there because their name got called, and which ones are there to put on a show. The proposed new format would shine a light on both of these players, reward effort, and likely incentivize the ‘lazy’ All-Stars to keep up, given they’ll have the threat of being so close to the end at the beginning.

No more needless stat-stuffing, boring in-game three-point contests, or players taking entire quarters off. The NBA All-Star tournament. A league/street fusion, celebrating the history of the competition of basketball, where the league’s best players come together to compete against each other to be the All-Stars of All-Stars. With REAL stakes on the line!

This is the cap to All-Star Weekend the NBA is sorely missing.