The NBA has been working tirelessly to try and fix one of its staples of attraction — the NBA All-Star game. Between player drafts, the well-received “Elam Ending,” and a new four-team tournament style format, is the league doing too much?
Thank you for reading this post, don't forget to subscribe!Phoenix Suns superstar Kevin Durant sure thinks so.
“I hate it, absolutely hate it, terrible” Durant said of the new format after it was announced Tuesday. “All-Star game formats changing, all the formats, it’s terrible in my opinion. We should just go back to East and West and just play the game.
“I think we’ve been trying to bring that flare back somehow with All-Star weekend, but I think we just keep it traditional. We’ll see how this one works, you never know, I might be wrong. I’m just another guy with another opinion, but we’ll see how it works.”
In an effort to garner more interest in the weekend, the NBA and NBPA announced the new format of the 2025 NBA All-Star Game which is being held in the San Francisco Bay Area this season. The new mini-tournament format consisting of 24 players, four teams and three games goes as follows:
- Three teams consist of eight NBA All-Stars, the fourth team is the winner of the Castrol Rising Stars game from Friday night’s All-Star slate.
- TNT analysts Charles Barkley, Shaquille O’Neal, Kenny Smith and Candace Parker will be honorary general managers of all four teams.
- Barkley, O’Neal and Smith will draft eight of the 24 NBA All-Stars to their teams. Parker will be assigned to the Rising Stars.
- The four teams will play in two semifinals games. The winners of each game will play in the championship game.
- The games are decided via Elam Ending, where the target score is 40 points.
A lot of moving pieces, yes. It will be a completely different format from the usual All-Star game, but NBA Commissioner Adam Silver has detailed often that he and league officials are open in trying any ways to make the game itself more entertaining. This is another part of that effort.
Suns coach Mike Budenholzer had a reaction of his own to the announcement of the new format.
“I’ll have to read about it. I’ll watch it with great anxiousness and excitement. I didn’t mean that, Adam (Silver).” Budenholzer said jokingly Tuesday.
Budenholzer, however, added that he enjoys coaching for a league that is open to trying unique things like this All-Star format to garner more attention to the sport.
“The NBA is incredible in how they are constantly trying to put the best product out there for our fans,” Budenholzer said. “(Silver) and the whole NBA are honestly continually pushing for us to be our best.”
The 2025 NBA All-Star Weekend is taking place Feb. 14-16, 2025 in the Chase Center in San Francisco, California.
New NBA All-Star game tournament won’t change anything if players still don’t care
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Reporter Connor Moreno covers the Phoenix Suns for Burn City Sports. You can follow him on his X account, @cmorenosports, and on Bluesky, @cloading.bsky.social
