The 2025 NBA All-Star was a dud. Fans had their doubts from the beginning when the new format was announced. While the games were underway, Draymond Green, Stephen A. Smith, and others voiced their discontent with the same. After the final game, Trae Young joined the group of people unhappy with the format.
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At the post-game presser, Young was asked if he enjoyed being part of the ASG’s new format. The four-time All-Star had a lot to say on the topic.
He said, “Nah, I didn’t like it at all, to be honest with you.”
Although Young wasn’t aware at the time about the fans’ reaction to the games, he had some issues with the format he simply couldn’t overlook. One of the biggest issues he had was the number and duration of the breaks taken during games.
When a reporter jokingly asked if he didn’t enjoy the 17-minute break, Young said, “It’s too long of a break. I didn’t know how long it was, but it felt like it was 30 minutes.”
The lack of continuity was baffling to fans as well. Young was also asked to comment on the 40-point rule introduced in this year’s ASG.
Trae Young sounds off on the NBA All-Star Game format and the super long break in the championship game: “I didn’t like it at all.” pic.twitter.com/GUv3luSUGj
— Dalton Johnson (@DaltonJ_Johnson) February 17, 2025
He said that he’d rather play the standard East-West All-Star Game. He believes that putting more effort into the old format and giving some incentives to the players to play better might have been a better decision than experimenting with such a format. Young wants the league to return to the old, reliable format and try to make those games more competitive and exciting.
This year we had four teams at the ASG. A team of ‘Rising Stars’ led by Candace Parker, and the respective teams of Shaquille O’Neal, Charles Barkley, and Kenny Smith. Young was a part of Chuck’s team ‘Global Stars.’ They faced Kenny’s ‘Young Stars’ in the first round and were the first to reach the 40-point mark.
Young and Co. faced ‘Shaq’s OGs’ where they fell 15 points short of the target.
While the effort made by the league to experiment with a new format is commendable, they need to do something else for next year’s ASG, because the popular belief is that this can’t continue the same way in the future.
