Why is the NBA All-Star Game format changing again? To boost competition — and intrigue

LAS VEGAS — As expected, the upcoming NBA All-Star Game in San Francisco will be a mini-tournament of three teams composed of the top 24 players in the league and the team that wins the Rising Stars Challenge.

Yes, the idea behind the change — this will be the league’s third different All-Star format since 2020 — is to try and make the game more competitive. But also, or instead, or at minimum, to make it more interesting to watch on TV.

“I think we’ve come to terms that modern All-Stars are in part about competition, but ultimately, they’re about entertaining the fans and creating a strong experience for them,” NBA commissioner Adam Silver said Tuesday in an interview with The Athletic and other national media outlets.

“As you guys know, I was wrong about last year,” Silver said. “I thought in Indiana that given the sort of fact it was sort of viewed as the heartland of basketball and a strong presence from some legends there, that the guys would roll the clock back a bit and play a traditional game and it wasn’t meant to be.

“And so we went back to the drawing board with the players association, again, talking directly to players and said, ‘Let’s come up with a format that we think has a better chance of creating a game, or in this case, a series of competitions that will be of interest to the fans.’”

The new format, announced jointly Tuesday by the NBA and National Basketball Players Association, will include three games — two semifinals and the championship — in which the winner is the team to reach 40 or more points first. There is a prize money pool of $1.8 million, with the champion team earning $125,000 per player.

The NBA and NBPA announced today a new format for the 2025 NBA All-Star Game in the San Francisco Bay Area.

In addition, NBA All-Star Voting presented by AT&T will tip off on Thursday, Dec. 19 at 10 a.m. ET.

Full details ➡️ https://t.co/KntyklRIe7 pic.twitter.com/3jIbW1tZWZ

— NBA Communications (@NBAPR) December 17, 2024

The selection of the league’s top stars will not change. Twelve players from each conference will be named All-Stars, with fans, media and players voting on the five “starters” and the seven reserves from each conference decided by coaches.

Those players will then go into a pool for picking by TNT’s three analysts — Charles Barkley, Kenny Smith and Shaquille O’Neal — who are serving as honorary general managers for the three All-Star teams. They will divide the teams into three groups of eight All-Stars on Feb. 6 before TNT’s weekly doubleheader.

Honorary general manager for the Rising Stars team is another Turner Sports analyst, Candace Parker. The Rising Stars Challenge takes place on the Friday of All-Star weekend; the All-Star tournament is on Feb. 16 at Chase Center.

The coaches for the All-Star Game will come from the staff of the first-place team in each conference as of Feb. 2. The head coach from each first-place team will coach an All-Star team, an assistant from one of the staffs will coach the Rising Stars champion and another assistant will coach the remaining All-Star team.

In November, The Athletic reported that Silver’s office was consulting with players, including the Golden State Warriors star Stephen Curry, on changing the All-Star Game again in another attempt to make the event more competitive. Silver credited players’ association executive director Andre Iguodala with leading the discussion on the players’ side with Silver’s office.

As Silver referenced, last year’s All-Star Game in Indianapolis set a new record for points scored — and that wasn’t a good thing, as players on both teams simply didn’t play with any effort whatsoever on defense.

“With the elephant in the room being us competing, them trying to shake things up is expected and makes sense,” said Oklahoma City star Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, who is a two-time All-Star. “But at the end of the day, it’s going to come down to whether the players want to go at it, and I would love to see that. Love to be a part of that for sure, and hopefully it happens.”

Fan voting for All-Stars will begin on Dec. 19. There were no changes announced to All-Star Saturday programming, but it is expected Curry and WNBA star Sabrina Ionescu, who is from the Bay Area, will engage in a shooting competition for the second consecutive All-Star Saturday.

Silver said the league has worked with the players association to decrease the All-Star Game pregame introductions and national anthem productions so the players could have a more normal warm-up routine before playing.

GO DEEPER

Steph Curry consults with NBA to change All-Star format for San Francisco game

“When I was a kid growing up and watching All Stars, it was one of the only opportunities you had as a fan to see many of these players,” Silver said. “It was one of the only time that these players came together. It’s just such a different world now. They’re together all the time. They’re together in the summer. They’re together on national teams.

“For us, it’s a recognition that it’s a different time,” Silver continued. “And, you know, we’ll see. I’m encouraged with this new format that we can create some real excitement there.”