SALT LAKE CITY — Once again, the NBA almost got it right.
Three years ago, when the NBA televised the All-Star draft for the first time as a pregame segment on Inside the NBA, I wrote a column arguing that the change didn't go far enough and what they should really do is have the two captains pick the teams on the court before the game, playground-style.
They finally implemented it this year, and it was a good deal of fun. But for some reason, they decided to change the order and draft the reserves before the starters, presumably to take the sting out of whichever player gets picked last.
That defeats the purpose of the entire exercise. Jaren Jackson Jr. was picked last among reserves. They should have leaned into calling him "Mr. Irrelevant." Maybe it would have led to him having a big moment in the game. The Grizzlies like to talk—they could have done something with it. Instead, they drafted the reserves, then the starters. As usual, the NBA overthought it by half.
On the other hand, doing it this way allowed Damian Lillard to add "No. 1 overall pick in the All-Star draft" to a weekend that's already seen him win the 3-Point Contest. I don't know whether Giannis Antetokounmpo was instructed to take him first to play up his Utah connections or there could be something going on this summer if Khris Middleton leaves the Bucks in free agency. Overall, doing the draft pregame was a positive change. It made the event drag out longer, but it was entertaining.
"I was up there and just said, 'We'll see how this goes," Lillard said afterwards. "They talked about not wanting to be picked last, but I honestly didn't trip. And then he picked me first and I was like, 'Cool.' I guess I get to be the No. 1 pick for once in my life."
And it ended, as it has before, with Lillard hitting the game-ending three-pointer to get Team Giannis to the target score for the Elam Ending.
"It's a real thing," Lillard said. "I come up big at the end. Obviously, tonight wasn't a real game where it was traps and real defense being played, but just those moments, I always find myself in those moments being the one."
Outside of LeBron James and DeMar DeRozan, Lillard was the oldest player on the floor between the two teams (Stephen Curry and Kevin Durant were unable to play due to injury). It's not too dissimilar a situation to the one he's in right now at his day job, as the only over-30 Trail Blazers player.
"It's actually kind of weird," Lillard said Saturday morning after All-Star practice. "I was just in the locker room and I was looking around, and I see Ja, Jaren Jackson, Zion Williamson, and I'm just looking around like, 'These dudes are really young.' It took me back to my first All-Star game, where it was like Kobe and Dirk, these older guys that seem like they've been retired forever. It was just a reminder that I'm getting old."
I'm not going to sugarcoat it: the actual All-Star Game was pretty unwatchable. That's not a minority opinion. Michael Malone, the head coach of Team LeBron, called it "the worst basketball game ever played." I'm not sure what they can do to "fix" it—I totally get why players don't want to play hard in an exhibition game and risk injury, but the whole thing feels pretty pointless. Maybe they do what the NFL did with the Pro Bowl and get rid of the actual game and focus the whole weekend on the events. People who make a lot more money than I do are in charge of deciding these things.
Here's much more of what I saw and heard in Utah over the weekend:
I was very pleasantly surprised that Lillard's 20-minute media availability on Saturday morning did not feature a single question about his loyalty to Portland. The bar isn't very high for these events, and there were some random questions about his pro wrestling Mount Rushmore and things of that nature, but we might finally be past the Running From The Grind Industrial Complex. (For the record: Lillard would start his phone, bench his video-game console and cut his laptop.)
Someone did ask Lillard about the best-Blazer-ever debate and I liked his answer: "Being the all-time leading scorer in franchise history, I think that's a big part of it, but I don't think that alone makes you the greatest Blazer of all time. Personally, I think I am. But I don't think it's really a question that I can just give an answer to and say I am. The fans and the people that have followed this organization for a long time, that have seen me and seen all the other guys play enough, I think that's for them to decide. But I think when it comes to the body of work, the consistency, the notoriety, the attention that I've brought to that market, being a signature athlete, global ambassador for games, winning a lot of games, having a lot of individual success, being able to do it over a long period of time, I feel like I've done everything but win a championship. So I feel that way, but that's for everybody else to decide."
I also liked Lillard's answer after the 3-Point Contest to a question about his confidence that his game will age well into his mid- to late-30s: "My game isn't based on being super-athletic or anything like that. I'm not the fastest point guard in the league. I play a quick game, a crafty game, I can shoot. Being able to shoot the way I can shoot it off the dribble, off the catch, off screens, whatever, that's a weapon that allows you to play for a longer period of time. And also, being a student of the game, it allows you to manipulate the game in ways that everybody can't do. For me, I know that I'll be able to play at a high level as long as I want to play. Not when I'm an old man, but I'll be able to do it for a long time. Getting the surgery last year, correcting something I had been dealing with for a long time, I feel like that set me back to 27. I'm basically 27 now. I've got a while to go."
Lillard let me hold his trophy as he was walking off the podium after winning it, and it's heavy. The thing is solid glass all the way through. The league spent some money on it.
I thought the halftime performance featuring Burna Boy, Tems and Rema was great. Can't say the same for the pregame performance from Post Malone, whose appeal escapes me completely.
At halftime, the NBA honored LeBron James for becoming the NBA's all-time leading scorer earlier this month. Much like the night he broke the record, it's great that Kareem Abdul-Jabbar was on hand to be a part of it. I didn't love that Karl Malone was there. There was entirely too much Karl Malone this weekend in general, for reasons you can look up if you want to.
I finally got to check out the Basketball Without Borders camp, an ancillary All-Star Weekend event I've wanted to go to for years. A couple of Blazers executives were among the group of front-office personnel from around the league on hand checking out talent from all over the world. And I got some background from people associated with the camp for a story I've wanted to do for a while that I'm hoping to write soon. Stay tuned.
Want to see a life-sized Ja Morant sculpture encased in a block of ice? Here you go.
I'm just sharing this tweet from Blazers photographer Bruce Ely for no reason in particular.
The dunk contest was actually pretty great, despite the absence of Shaedon Sharpe. Like most people, I thought Mac McClung's inclusion was a gimmick when it was first announced. Inviting a fringe G League player who was viral in Instagram two years ago is exactly the kind of clout-chasing move the NBA has gone for in the past few years. But McClung was spectacular, as was Trey Murphy III. Outside of a goofy 3D-printed ball sponsored by AT&T that Keyon Martin Jr. used, there weren't very many gimmicks. Certainly nothing as embarrassing as Jalen Green's NFT chain last year. And for the most part, the dunkers all made their dunks on the first attempt, which is much more important than people give it credit for. I still wish Sharpe was in it. He can't say no two years in a row.
NBA commissioner Adam Silver held his annual state-of-the-union press conference on Saturday night. He took questions on a variety of hot-button issues, including load management, superstar trade demands, the state of flux currently facing the RSN business, and reports of Knicks owner James Dolan using facial recognition technology to target social-media critics. His stock answer to most of these questions was that everything is going great and none of these issues are actually that big a deal. It's up to you how much you buy into that.
There were two pieces of news from Silver's press conference. One was that he's optimistic that the NBA and the players' union will be able to figure out a new collective-bargaining agreement ahead of the March 30 opt-out date. I've always been skeptical there would be a lockout, because everyone is making way too much money right now to risk a work stoppage, but it was good to hear directly from the commissioner that he thinks it will get done.
The other piece of news, which is consistent with what I've heard and thought for several months, is that the league plans to look seriously at expansion after the new CBA and the upcoming media-rights deal get sorted out. In the coming years, Silver and others in the league will pretend there are other cities in the mix and the new expansion teams haven't already been decided, but it's going to be Seattle and Las Vegas.
There is no word yet on where All-Star Weekend will be after next year's event, which is scheduled to take place in Indianapolis. ESPN reported that Milwaukee is looking to submit a bid for either 2025 or 2026, and there was a lot of buzz out here over the weekend that Los Angeles and Phoenix are in the mix, too. My vote is for somewhere a little warmer than the last few.
On that subject: My understanding is that the Blazers are hoping to submit a bid for All-Star Weekend closer to the end of the decade. There are some renovations that need to happen on the Rose Quarter campus before that's realistic. But given that Portland is hosting the NCAA Women's Final Four in 2030, there's some urgency to get it done by then, and theoretically an All-Star bid might follow.