NBA All-Star Weekend begins today. Indianapolis, land of a thousand points. Friday and Saturday, the party’s at Lucas Oil Stadium. Events include—deep breath, prepare for brands and trademarks—the Ruffles NBA All-Star Celebrity Game, Kia Skills Challenge, STARRY® 3-Point Contest, and AT&T Slam Dunk, which, apparently, does not have the word “contest” in its name any longer? Language, who needs it? Excuse me. In the style of the NBA and its business partners: Language, who needs? One thing that’s especially notable this year is that participants will be playing on television. Excuse me, let me take that again. They will be playing on top of a television. The ultimate in picture in picture. The future is now, and it wants your eyes to bleed.
The NBA is touting its new “state-of-the-art full video LED court” as its latest innovation designed to enhance the viewing experience. The league’s announcement was a breeding ground for PR mumbo jumbo. Terms like “high-performance, immersive sports floor,” “endless amount of animation capabilities,” and “interactive displays.” During the events on Friday and Saturday, on-court effects will include:
- Design and color changes
- Live replays and other video content
- Real-time game stats
- Location-based player tracking animations
- Interactive games for fans during timeouts
- Immersive animations following key plays and moments
May also cause seizures or changed channels. If this court is going to happen, they need to lean fully into it. If any of the events get boring, just start showing more exciting stuff on the LED screen. Jacob Toppin is taking forever to complete a dunk attempt? Turn on Ocean’s Eleven. Any scene with Elliott Gould or Bernie Mac. Turner for sure has the rights. It’s not counterprogramming if it’s all happening on the same channel.
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Hard not to see the glowing new playing surface as anything other than an indictment of the stuff taking place on it. This whole weekend is meant to showcase the league’s greatest, playing basketball. Dame Lillard’s nuclear 3-point shooting is not enough to hold our attention; neither is watching the top two picks in last year’s draft play on the same team. So look over here at these flashing lights. As we recall, the league loves to show off, but I never thought that it would take it this far. What do I know? Pay no attention to the people performing on the court. Yes, they are literally our best and brightest, but check out the floor. Look at our fun, new ground. It’s so shiny. Here’s what will be happening on it.
Friday
NBA All-Star Celebrity Game
The “Celebrity” Game is at 7 p.m. ET. Team Shannon (Sharpe) will take on Team Stephen A. (Smith). Joining Sharpe on the bench are assistants 50 Cent and Peyton Manning, with Lil Wayne and A’ja Wilson rounding out Smith’s coaching staff. The rosters, look, it’s not the Met Gala. Not devoid of wattage but not swimming in it either. Those quotation marks are there for a reason. The NBA has never played faster and looser with the term “celebrity.” Keep your Google close by.
Team Shannon
Anuel AA, Kai Cenat, Conor Daly, Walker Hayes, Quincy Isaiah, Jewell Loyd, Micah Parsons, Lilly Singh, SiR, Dylan Wang
Team Stephen A.
Adam Blackstone, Natasha Cloud, Jennifer Hudson, Tristan Jass, AJ McLean, Kwame Onwuachi, Metta World Peace, Jack Ryan, C.J. Stroud, Gianmarco Tamberi
No clue or care who wins, but I could certainly see Lilly Singh trying to put Jennifer Hudson on her ass. Either way, I hope World Peace brings back the D-Band and starts a trend. The world is ready. It’s what leaders wear. A product for today’s hip-hop and sports enthusiast. Soak it up. Brad Miller did.
Rising Stars
The four coaches for the Panini Rising Stars game are Pau Gasol, Tamika Catchings, Jalen Rose, and Detlef Schrempf. Schrempf will coach a team of G Leaguers. For some reason, it has not yet been announced that another former Pacer and Schrempf’s Entertainment 720 colleague Roy Hibbert will be joining him as an assistant. The league is almost certainly treating this as a surprise announcement to be unveiled right before tip because an omission like that is glaring and embarrassing. Do the right thing, Adam. The other three coaches participated in a snake draft over Zoom. Each team gets seven players. Gasol took French wunderkind Victor Wembanyama with the first pick and, throughout the draft, repeatedly took a few moments at the top of his turn to compliment the other two on the quality of their selections. Catchings took Paolo Banchero second, and Rose took Chet Holmgren third. Here’s how the rosters shook out.
Team Gasol
Victor Wembanyama, Brandon Miller, Brandin Podziemski, Jaime Jaquez Jr., Jabari Smith Jr., Cason Wallace, Bilal Coulibaly
Team Catchings
Paolo Banchero, Jaden Ivey, Jalen Duren, Keegan Murray, Scoot Henderson, Keyonte George, Vince Williams Jr.
Team Rose
Chet Holmgren, Jalen Williams, Bennedict Mathurin, Jeremy Sochan, Dereck Lively II, Jordan Hawkins, Walker Kessler
Gasol’s nab of Wallace with the 18th pick is just ridiculous value. Almost as good as grabbing Jaquez at 12. Great work by him. Only downfall was he for sure pronounced Jaime as “Jayme.” Weird flub from a Spanish guy. Would be like Kendrick Perkins screwing up Moses Moody’s name and, actually, never mind, that’s a bad example. Win some, lose some. Anyway, Gasol’s roster is loaded. They’re the favorites, but Rose has put together a scrappy squad himself. Ideally Wembanyama and Chet will get into it at center court before the ball goes up and the floor starts playing the bathroom fight from Mission: Impossible—Fallout. Let it run until Rebecca Ferguson shows up. She deserves it.
Saturday
Skills Challenge
Somehow still a thing. There will be three teams of three. You will have the urge to look at your phone during the event, and you will give in. That’s OK.
Team Pacers
Tyrese Haliburton, Bennedict Mathurin, Myles Turner
Team Top Picks
Paolo Banchero, Victor Wembanyama, Anthony Edwards
Team All-Stars
Scottie Barnes, Tyrese Maxey, Trae Young
Congrats to the league for giving up on trying to find a third team and just going with Team Guys Playing in the Actual All-Star Game Who Would Say Yes. It’s a low-stakes event that is hardly ever remembered. Best thing they could possibly do is mic up Edwards for its entirety and just let him announce the whole thing while he plays. Obviously TNT will not do that. Reggie Miller has to speak once every 30 seconds or else he explodes. In a vacuum, I’d take Team Top Picks but fear there may be some too-cool-for-schoolness to contend with among that bunch. Team We’re Already Here has bigger fish to fry come Sunday.
So Team Pacers is the pick. They’ll have the hometown crowd squarely behind them, will want to put on a show for their fans, and will claim the city as their own. If the league really wants to spice things up and get more eyeballs on the evening, they should let the players dress however they want. Leave the jerseys and warm-ups at the hotel. If Haliburton wants to show up and hoop in a Newsies hat, go wild, Ty. Bring your big coat. The one that makes it look like you’re about to ask me whether I have any known aliases. Let Wemby hoop in a murdered-out balaclava, then sell them online. Do whatever it takes to inject some personality or energy into the event. Anything that isn’t Reggie screaming the word partner at Spero Dedes all night.
3-Point Contest
Kaponoland. Where the stars are. These days, if you want to see the big names perform on Saturday, tune in here. This is where top dogs still show up and show out. The field is theoretically stacked: Malik Beasley, Jalen Brunson, Tyrese Haliburton, Damian Lillard, Lauri Markkanen, Donovan Mitchell, Karl-Anthony Towns, and Trae Young.
There’s just more glitz here. Six of the contestants are All-Stars this year, Markkanen’s played All-Star-caliber ball, and then there’s also Beasley. One of these things is not like the others, but this is not about the entirety of the players, only the state of their respective flamethrowers. Are they operational or not? The shooting talent here is serious. Numbers could get really high. Lillard is your defending champion, but most any of them could get hot and win it. Our money’s on Brunson, the New King of New York, who has led the Knicks back to relevance and transformed into one of the deadliest 3-point threats in the league. The vibes are always right with Brunson, and there’s something about the Knicks in Indiana. Drama abounds, things happen.
Noticeably absent from the proceedings this year is the greatest shooter of all time. Steph Curry is not participating in the contest. Instead, he’s focusing his energies on the Stephen Vs. Sabrina 3-Point Challenge happening directly after. Take it away, NBA.com:
NBA all-time 3-point leader and Golden State Warriors guard Stephen Curry and WNBA single-season 3-point record holder and New York Liberty guard Sabrina Ionescu will compete in “Stephen vs. Sabrina,” the first-ever NBA vs. WNBA 3-Point Challenge.
This is an exciting addition to NBA All-Star Weekend, one I would love to get Lillard’s opinion on. Wait, didn’t I beat Curry to win this event last year? Ionescu wins and shimmies in Steph’s face. Reggie Miller ascends to a higher plane of existence.
Slam Dunk
The dunk contest comes limping into the fray once more, held together by current G Leaguers and bits of string. How this is still the hammer event of the night makes little sense, but some traditions die hard. The dunk contest is a sometimes electric, often boring affair filled with props, alternate jerseys, and bad passes. Your 2024 contestants are Jaylen Brown, Jaime Jaquez Jr., Jacob Toppin, and Mac McClung. I don’t know either, y’all.
Toppin’s Obi’s brother. He’s a two-way player for the Knickerbockers, has appeared in all of five games for the big club this season, and scored a total of 13 points. Eleven of those came in a blowout loss to the Magic on Valentine’s Day. McClung plays for the Magic, but not the ones in Orlando. He’s gigging the G League, taken his talent to Osceola. Since 2021, McClung has seen action in four NBA games, but that didn’t stop him from winning this contest a year ago. He’s back to defend his crown. Major credit to Brown and Jaquez for joining the party and putting themselves out there. Jaquez is one of the sturdiest rookies to enter the league in a minute, plays with verve and mettle, and has been a bright spot on both ends for the Heat since the season began. Easy to root for. Aesthetics are on point. Fingers crossed he has some tricks in him. Brown is the lone actual All-Star in the mix, and the 300 Million Dollar Man has a higher profile than basically any contestant of the past decade. He’s a rubbery athlete with plenty of springs who has punched home some monster in-game dunks over the years. Hopefully the blockbuster mashing translates to an empty court. Hopefully he keeps the dribbling to a minimum. Hopefully he’s learned how to spell “Naismith.”
A bit obvious to say, but it’s probably not great that half the participants on TNT’s preview graphic are wearing G League uniforms. Not what you want. Seems like it might make it slightly more difficult to tune in.
They may as well make the participants a secret. It would build more buzz. Convince us someone big-time has said yes. Use your desperate-for-a-scoop reporters to your advantage and leak possible names. Have Woj drop an early February “sources say Anthony Edwards is a name to keep an eye on as a potential surprise contestant in this year’s dunk contest.” Lie to us, pretend someone backed out at the last minute, anything to try to convince the viewing public you have more respect for our time than you obviously do. Jacob? For real? Couldn’t even get Obi to come back? I mean, hell, at this rate, put Thanasis in there. At least there’s potential he might forget himself, klutz it up, and get stuffed by the rim.
Sunday
The 2024 NBA All-Star Game
After a few glorious years of interconference rosters and live drafts, the NBA is regressing, running back to the old ways. Get back to your regions, guys, back to the past. It’s West with West and East with East. And Brangelina’s with Frangelina. Moving on. Actually, no, we stay here. We stay and complain more. The NBA has called it a return to the “classic format” of the All-Star Game. This is a bad move and not as fun as what we switched to. The open-to-the-public live draft was fantastic. It was dramatic and weird, uncomfortable and revealing. More than once it flirted with being major entertainment. Back to the doldrums of regionality.
The game itself is historically pretty blah. If defense is played at all, there’s a good chance it was an accident, one that will be corrected quickly. A 48-minute ode to the uncontested alley-oop. The moments of true competitiveness stand out because they are so rare. Shawn Marion’s actual attempts to guard Michael Jordan in 2003, Iverson bringing the East back in 2001, the first year of the Elam Ending.
There are two first-time starters this year. For the East, it’s Indiana’s Haliburton. For the West, it’s Oklahoma City’s Shai Gilgeous-Alexander. This is the second All-Star selection for both, and each has a bag built for All-Star games. Haliburton passes the ball like someone told him an angel gets their wings every time he does. Gilgeous-Alexander’s iso package has become increasingly more Neo-fied. He collapses ankles, pretzels flesh. Other West starters include LeBron James, Luka Doncic, Kevin Durant, and Nikola Jokic. Joining Haliburton as starters for the East are Giannis Antetokounmpo, Joel Embiid (out with injury), Damian Lillard, and Jayson Tatum.
The NBA’s switching up the location for Sunday, and the game itself is happening at Gainesbridge Fieldhouse, the home of the Pacers. The LED court will not make the trip. Will we wish it had? Maybe we’ll see two missed dunks in a row followed by a few missed 30-footers, someone will smoke an oop off the backboard, and we will wish the playing surface could show us what real-deal Ocean’s Eleven–level teamwork looks like. Ah, well. Maybe next year.
