Adam Silver spent the lead-up into the 2024 NBA All-Star game promising fans that they would get a better product. He told media that people were “uniformly critical” of last year’s game, including players, and that this year’s game would be more competitive. 

That promise turned out to be a farce. There was even less defense played than in a normal game, most of the play devolved quickly into shooting 3’s, and the record was shattered for most points in an All-Star game.

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Silver did not seem particularly happy about that last part. 

Two-time All-Star Anthony Edwards addressed the issue head-on.

“I don’t think I will ever look at like being super competitive,” Edwards told media. I think everyone looks at it as a break. I don’t think nobody wants to come here and compete.” 

If the players don’t want to compete, then the incentive structure has to be changed. Here are some ideas to get that to happen, starting small and getting progressively more out there. 

How to fix the NBA All-Star game

Raise the incentives for winning the game

We saw during the league’s inaugural in-season tournament (IST) that putting big cash incentives for the winner drew the attention of the players and led to a great product being created. 

That magic number was $500,000 per player for the winning IST team. The current structure for the All-Star game awards $100,000 to the winning team and $25,000 to the losing team. Bump that winning number up to $500 grand, and the players will compete for it. 

Move the game to the end of the year

The big issue with the All-Star game is that the players need the rest and don’t want to risk injury.

Kobe Bryant addressed this issue head-on during an appearance on the “Knuckleheads” podcast back in 2019.

“Guys play harder at a pickup game at UCLA, and it ain’t billions of people watching.”

Moving the game to the summer would remove the need for rest from the equation. Players would be free to concentrate on the game, giving a better product. 

This would also lead to better selections. Some of the best players miss out on the game due to injuries at the start of the year. Having a full year of work to go off would give the honor to the most deserving players. 

Get NBA players out of the dunk contest

The best dunkers in the world aren’t in the NBA — they’re on various social media outlets, spending their time perfecting creative dunks. Mac McClung has dominated the field for two years in a row, in part because he has honed his dunking skills through those platforms. 

NBA players are repeating the same dunks over and over, making the contest boring. There are some incredible dunkers out there that nobody has heard of. The NBA should lean into that and give a deserving platform to the true best dunker in the world, letting the All-Stars act as judges.

Expand rosters and turn it into a 32-man knockout 1-on-1 tournament

There is nothing better in sports than knockout tournaments. Why not turn All-Star Weekend into one?

Imagine seeing Stephen Curry go 1-on-1 against Nikola Jokic, or LeBron James and Kevin Durant squaring off. Players practice 1-on-1 settings all of the time in the summer. This would be a great opportunity to show how high the skill level is across the league. 

Ban the losers from participating next year

Want to make the game cutthroat? Change the format back to a draft, then prevent anyone from the losing team to be named an All-Star in next year’s game. 

This would additionally solve the problem of too few players getting selected every year. By weeding out 12 players, the league could expand the pool of players that it is promoting, allowing deserving guys a chance to get into their first game.