It’s that time of the year again. The NBA All-Star Game will take place on Feb. 15 in Madison Square Garden, New York City where fans are given the opportunity to vote for their favorite athletes they believe should play in the Eastern and Western conference as a starter. However, the process of choosing which player should make the All-Star roster each year is biased.
A lot of times, when fans vote for a player, they only consider the athlete’s past accomplishments and don’t necessarily take into account their current performance levels. The point of the game is to watch the best players for that season compete against each other, which can only happen if the selection process is fair. Otherwise, the title “All-Star Game” should be changed to “Fans Favorite All-Star Game.”
The coaches are responsible for voting for the reserve members of the team, but there have been many examples of players who didn’t have good season performances and yet received votes to become All-Star starters, while others who had great seasons are overlooked. The NBA should go strictly by current season statistics simply because “people lie, numbers don’t”; this would make the process fair. I also think the players themselves should have a say in deciding who they think played like an All-Star during the season as they are the ones who have to compete against other players in the regular season. They know who deserves to make the All-Star roster.
I understand that the NBA is a business, and it is strategic to make fans a part of the process, since they are the ones who are purchasing the tickets. But I don’t think the league will lose much money if fans don’t get to vote for their favorite athletes. Fans don’t have any say in determining which teams will make it to the finals each year, and the NBA still generates a lot of money, so why should this be any different? Fans still purchase tickets to go see the championship game every year, even when their favorite team is not playing, because they want to witness the two best teams of the season compete against each other.
The NBA All-Star Game should be thought of and treated the same way the finals are, where the best teams for that season earn their spots. If the NBA left it up to fans to choose the team they think should play in the championship each year, there would be teams with championship titles who didn’t work for it.
Each year, after a team wins a championship, there is never any doubt whether they deserve it because they had to compete for it. The same cannot be said for the All-Star game. There are always questions about whether certain players deserve to make the All-Star roster. If the NBA doesn’t change the procedure on choosing players, then there will always be those who deserve to be All-Stars because the decision is left up to the fans, who vote for their favorite players instead of those with exceptional athletic ability.
Photo credit: freshnyc.com
