
As announced by the NBA earlier this week, the league will be changing the format of the All-Star Game, set to take place in San Francisco in February 2025. Much different from the All-Star Games of recent years, the 2025 All-Star Game will instead be a mini-tournament, featuring four teams and three games total.
24 players will be named All-Stars and divided into three teams, with each team being managed by one of TNT’s NBA analysts in Shaquille O’Neal, Charles Barkley, and Kenny Smith. The fourth team will be the Rising Stars Game winning team which will take place before the tournament. WNBA legend Candace Parker will manage the winning team.
The two teams will each play one game with the winner facing the winner between the other two teams. In the championship game, the two winning teams will have to reach or exceed 40 points.
The four teams will compete for a prize pool with the players winning team winning $125,000 each. Players on the second-place team receive $50,000 each, and the players on both the third and fourth-place teams receive $25,000 each.
The new All-Star game format has already received much criticism from players and media alike. When asked about the new format, Phoenix Suns forward Kevin Durant would share his feelings about the new ASG:
“Terrible — All-Star Game format changing, all the formats — terrible in my opinion,” Durant said. “We should just go back to East-West. Just play a game.”
In addition to Durant, NBA media personality Stephen A. Smith would sound off on the new All-Star Game format, blaming the players for the changes:
“The players have ruined All-Star Weekend. It’s their fault that [the new format] is happening… They have shamed the game of basketball… I personally have no desire to be in attendance for it… This is not Adam Silver’s fault.”
The 2025 ASG would be the most recent change to the All-Star Game format. From the first All-Star Game in 1951 to 2017, the game would be Eastern Conference vs Western highest vote-getters in each conference being captains of their teams and drafting their teams from the pool of All-Stars.
The 2020 All-Star Game would see another change, adding an Elam ending with a target score being set. The target would first be 24 points in addition to the points scored in the three quarters, in honor of the late great Kobe Bryant who passed away a month before the game.
The All-Star Game has received much criticism over the last handful of years with the game not being competitive like it was decades ago in the eyes of many. While the All-Star Games before the 2010s were exciting for the opportunity to see team-ups that would never happen, the modern-day Big Three era has seen many of the stars in the ASG team up. The game has been criticized for the lack of defense being played in addition to much of the game featuring players chucking up three-point shots.
It is not known if this new format will become the new format of the game going forward, but the reaction to the new format continues to put the future of the ASG into question. The Rising Stars Game will take place on February 14th and the three tournament games will take place on February 16th.
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