All-Star Absurdity

We all know that the NBA loves its All-Star Weekend and, to be fair, there's a lot to like.  Fans love All-Star Saturday Night, which is highlighted by the often-scripted but always-entertaining Slam Dunk Contest and also includes the Three Point Shootout and the Skills Challenge.  The league uses Friday night to showcase its up-and-coming stars in a game that matches the best rookies against the best second-year players, and Sunday's All-Star game itself is always loaded with star power both on and off the court.  In light of all this, we can't really blame the NBA for taking time out of an already-rushed post-lockout 2011-12 season to fit in a late-February All-Star Game in Orlando.

We can, however, criticize the way the NBA is going about selecting starters for the All-Star Game this year.  First, let me caveat the rest of this post with a disclaimer: I think that any All-Star game which selects its participants through fan voting is a joke.  If we want to have a Most-Popular game, that would be something else - players for that game should be 100% fan determined, and we could have Tim Tebow start at point guard for the Western Conference for all I care.  The All-Star game, however, should be used to recognize the best players in the league at the time of time game, and history has proven that fans cannot be trusted to distinguish "best" from some combination of "cool," "notorious" and "accomplished." What follows are grumblings about this year's process specifically, though in fact I'm against fan voting of any sort.

If you're still reading, let me explain where I take issue with the 2012 NBA All-Star ballot.  Apparently, a panel of media members were called on to determine which NBA players belong on the All-Star ballot this year.  In baseball, every player who finds himself starting on opening day (plus or minus a few exceptions) gets his name on the ballot.  The NBA, however, has determined that the media should pre-screen the players before the fans get to vote, limiting their options to 24 forwards, 24 guards and 12 centers per conference.  Don't ask me how these players were chosen, as there's seemingly no logical reasoning behind it.  Nevermind the fact that I can't vote for a guy like Iman Shumpert, who as a rookie has become an unexpected leader for my Knicks.  I also can't vote for Knicks starting guards Landry Fields or Tony Douglas even if I wanted to, but I have the option to pick D.J. Augustin, Anthony Morrow or Jose Calderon.  Why?  Beats me.

Despite the restricted ballot, I can still vote for this veritable Dream Team.

This season more than any other, I would think the NBA would be anticipating a lot of surprises.  With a packed schedule, fewer off days and less pre-season time to prepare, there's no telling who this year's top players will be.  In light of this, how does shrinking the size of the All-Star player pool make any sense?  If anything, shouldn't we be making virtually every player on an NBA roster available for the vote, to cover ourselves if players like Shumpert, Greg Monroe or Ryan Anderson have monster seasons?  And why let the media determine which players should be eligible for the All-Star game?  Sure, there's a write-in option, but we know nobody really counts those, right?

The NBA All-Star Game needs to decide what it wants to be.  If it's all about the fans and is meant purely for their entertainment, then let the people vote for whomever they want and don't restrict the ballot.  If it's meant to recognize the season's most accomplished players, ditch fan voting entirely and have some combination of the coaches, players and media determine who's most deserving.  In either case, the current system doesn't make much sense for anyone, and serves as another example of the league's failure to think this season through.