The NBA 2018 All-Star Game Draft

Yesterday, the teams for the 2018 All-Star game were picked in a new format that was suggested by the NBPA President Chris Paul on behalf of the players who thought that the current format had gotten a little drab, with players having nothing really to play for and the fans also not getting any excitement out of the All-Star weekend.

The new format was basically picking five starters from the two conferences with 50% of fan votes and 50% of the players, coaches and media votes will be combined to give us the 10 starters. The coaches picked the reserves that made up the rest of the squad. The players with the highest votes on each conference became the team captains. Stephen Curry and LeBron James were the team captains respectively. Since Lebron had more votes than Curry, he received the first pick from the starters pool and Curry received the first pick from the reserves pool. Oddly, this draft was not televised and was done over a conference call according to most sources. We do not know the order of the picks that LeBron and Curry made, which makes this even more interesting. So here are the two teams that were picked by LeBron and Curry:

Team LeBron: LeBron James (C), Kevin Durant, Kyrie Irving, Anthony Davis, DeMarcus Cousins*, Russell Westbrook, LaMarcus Aldridge, Kevin Love, Bradley Beal, Kristaps Porzingis, John Wall, Victor Oladipo.

Ironically the President doesn't make the cut

Team Curry: Steph Curry (C), Giannis Antetokoumpo, James Harden, DeMar DeRozan, Joel Embiid, Jimmy Butler, Draymond Green, Klay Thompson, Damian Lillard, Al Horford, Kyle Lowry, Karl-Anthony Towns.

The first hand of these two teams seems to put Team LeBron at a slight advantage over Team Curry due to the sheer iso-talent on the roster that Lebron has assembled. Most of his players can create something out of nothing, which truly makes them All-Stars. Beal, Porzingis, Oladipo and Aldridge, have all had breakout seasons with something to prove.

Team Curry, on the other hand, has a bunch of seasoned stars who may not look so eye-popping simply on paper but have been ravaging their opponents this season. Embiid has been staying fit and absolutely terrorizing defences, Giannis is having an MVP season, Harden is most probably going to be MVP this season, having carried the Rockets to two wins over the Warriors already, Jimmy Butler is making Minnesota matter again.

For me, the teams should lineup as follows:

Team LeBron: Russell Westbrook(PG), Kyrie Irving (SG), LeBron James (SF), Anthony Davis (PF), Kevin Durant (C).

Team Curry: Steph Curry (PG), James Harden (SG), Jimmy Butler (SF), Giannis Antentokoumpo (PF), Joel Embiid(C).

* DeMarcus Cousins has suffered an injury and thus misses the All-Star game. Paul George was picked in his stead.