Years ago, the All-Star Weekend rocked.

I always made sure I had time to watch it, pleading with my parents to stay up and watch the whole thing — the actual game is always played on a Sunday, which was sometimes a school night.

Watching the Rising Stars game Friday night, the All-Star Saturday night, and then the game on Sunday night was something I’d look forward to for weeks leading up to the weekend. It was fun to see my favorite players play — when it was worth setting aside time for. This year, I turned it off and watched Shameless instead.

Two weeks ago was the worst All-Star Weekend — not game, but weekend — I’ve seen in my lifetime. Seriously. This isn’t hyperbole, but the truth from someone who has been watching for probably 12 years, and won’t for the foreseeable future.

The game has been on a downward trend for the last three or four years. In 2020, Kyle Lowry was mocked on the internet for taking a charge, or in other words, playing hard. What are we doing here? Last year’s game was the highest-scoring ASG ever — it got past 200 points! It was basically just a three-point shootaround, where players were just jacking threes from the parking lot.

After the Rising Stars Game Friday night, the Skills Challenge onward was a disaster. The first group was a microcosm of the All-Star Weekend as a whole — Chris Paul and sophomore sensation Victor Wembanyama got disqualified from a basketball obstacle course. Paul instructed the young Wemby to throw the balls on the ground instead of making valid shot attempts. Honestly, I wasn’t surprised that Paul would go that low — he’s one to complain to refs about jersey infractions, dive at people’s knees, and undercut flying dunkers — but cheating in a meaningless skills challenge?

The Dunk Contest has been dead since Aaron Gordon and Zach LaVine duked it out in 2016, and it’s taken a G-League player in Mac McClung to make it remotely interesting. This is no disrespect to McClung because his high school tape is insane, but why are the league’s high flyers like Ja Morant and Giannis Antetokounmpo not participating?

Now, I also understand that I’m not a player, and I’m not the one being asked to perform in the middle of the season in a game that has no outcome on the playoffs. It’s a meaningless game — I get that. 

I hate to be an “athletes get paid so much money, it’s part of their job to perform” kind of guy, but that’s how I feel. The Athletic conducted a poll on NBA All-Stars during the Weekend, and seven of the 20 players interviewed said a financial incentive would move the needle for them to take it seriously.
Really? Contracts in the NBA are bigger than ever before, and they want more money? 

Again, I understand that they are being paid accordingly for the value of their franchises and the multibillion-dollar industry. But can they do something to show respect to the game, for fans and each other alike? A frequent rebuttal is the injury argument that says players should coast out of fear of injury. The only injury in the history of the ASG is Dwyane Wade headbutting Kobe Bryant and breaking his nose. Those two were some of the fiercest competitors in the league, and Wade’s emotions got the best of him — I’m not advocating for injuries, but a little fire would be nice!

Kobe said “it used to be competitive. Fans want to see the best pick-up game in the world. They want to see what happens when you get the collection of the best basketball players on the planet and they play and they go head-up against each other.” Continuing, he said “I always loved competing in them … I didn’t lose many of them”.

None of the new players have the same fire that Michael Jordan, Allen Iverson, Chris Paul and Kobe did — the “Uncle Brigade” is exempt from this conversation — and it’s sad. Almost no current players seem to care.

The NBA knew that something needed to change, so they changed the format of the All-Star Game — it was now games, with an “S.” The winner of Candace Parker’s Rising Stars game faced Kenny Smith’s “Young Stars,” while Charles Barkley’s Global Stars faced Shaq’s “OGs,” the aforementioned “Uncle Brigade.”

These games were played to 40, with painful, cringe commentary from Mr. Beast and Kevin Hart between games that overshadowed the actual gameplay. Hart has a longer “highlight reel” of jokes than new All-Stars Alperen Şengün and Cade Cunningham’s game minutes. 30 minutes of the three-hour coverage was actual basketball. All frill, no foundation.

Additionally, Hart’s spineless, unfunny “comedy” was inappropriate for the game, which had kids like myself 10 years ago watching when he said Shaquille O’Neal’s large hat made him look like a “porn director.” Really, NBA? Really? How would my parents react if I heard that at 8 years old?

Trae Young said that the new format made it difficult to stay warm and loose. With three games played on Sunday night — remember, the Rising Stars game was played Friday — it’s unreasonable to ask players to play a 20-minute game, sit down, then play another. No wonder no one played hard. Asking players to compete, sit down, then compete again is dangerous and unreasonable. Failure, yet again.

When asked what should change about the All-Star Game, Wembanyama offered a U.S.-World game, and this has to be the next logical step — so many of the league’s best players are foreign-born, and the Olympics are evidence that players play hard for their country. The NHL did this for their All-Star Break, reintroducing the “4 Nations Face-Off”, and it was a smashing success for both players and fans, creating a game worth playing and watching. 

The thought of watching Nikola Jokic, Luka Dončić, Antetokounmpo, Wembanyama, SGA and more stars — if we extend “World” to father and motherlands — compete against American players is infinitely more appealing to watch.

Now, at the end of this tirade, I recognize I sound entitled and whiny. After all, I am sitting on my couch while these guys are playing on my TV screen, but many people agree with me — that same Athletic poll from earlier found that one-third of NBA fans believe the All-Star Game is a lost cause.

I suggest that the league move forward with an international vs. U.S. game expeditiously because ratings are only continuing to drop. Save it while you still can.

Jake Vasilias is a disgruntled Chicago sports fan with dangerous optimism for this upcoming Bears season. Trust him when he says this is their season. If you disagree, you can write to him at jpv25@pitt.edu