Adam Silver talks ways of improving the NBA All-Star game / News - Basketnews.com

The Commissioner of the NBA, Adam Silver, shared remarks and plans on how to make the NBA All-Star game more competitive in the wake of the return to the East-West format.

Credit: AP-SCANPIX Credit AP-SCANPIX

Adam Silver, the Commissioner of the NBA, gave an interview to The Old Man & The Three podcast in which he talked about a plethora of issues. Towards the end of the interview, Silver shared some interesting remarks about the All-Star competition.

Silver first addressed a question directed to him about players' performances in the All-Star game.

"How does the league expect the players to go out and play as if it's a real game and putting aside the parties, but even when there's a concert beforehand, the [player] intros go on, and they are standing there [watching the intros] and all that…" Silver talked about the showmanship involved in the All-Star games on the part of the NBA.

He emphasized that for the upcoming All-Star game, the NBA wanted to return to its roots where basketball is more underscored in comparison to entertainment components of the league.

"Under the theme of 'back to basketball,' even going to the heartland of basketball in Indiana and going to Indianapolis this year for the All-Star Game," Silver noted the decision to have the game be in Indiana, where basketball was invented.

This came directly from discussions with players, which was all right. We get it, like, nobody was happy about the experience last year, no one at all," Silver was brutally honest about last year's low-rated All-Star game.

"You know, it's not Joe Dumars or me necessarily saying we expect you to be playing like it's the Finals, but we need a game," he sternly argued.

He continued from the perspective of the players.

"And I think what we got back from the players was, 'but then you got to let us run through our typical routines, this is how we prepare for games, and if you're going to have us do a quick shoot around and stand there for 20 minutes while you do these really fancy intros, as much as everybody might love them, then you can't also expect us to play a game," Silver said, expressing sympathy with NBA players.

"That's where a sort of a rebalancing at the league is necessary," he noted. "Which is, we love the entertainment side, the sizzle around the league, but if basketball is what's most important, that that's at the center of these concentric circles of what we value, then players should be able to go through their normal routines," argued Silver.

The commissioner continued to empathize with the players.

"We can extend halftime two minutes but not 10 minutes, you know, because, again, as you well know, you're accustomed to a certain routine, your body is loaded to perform in a certain way…"

He continued with a small dose of sorrow about the future of the NBA.

"Every year, there becomes less emphasis on the game itself," Silver said. "[We are asked] wasn't it great you guys did this fancy technology summit on Friday, and you have [the] newsmaker breakfast, and we had a big seminar on Africa last year and the league we are creating there…" he gave a list of recent initiatives by the NBA.

"Things of enormous interest to the people who were there at Salt Lake City for the game, but then it's a reminder to us [that] when the weekend is over, and you're looking at the post-weekend commentary, 95% of it is about the game. None of them is 'Wasn't that a great party Friday night?'" he concluded with a slight hint of sarcasm.

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