All-Star Bolts: Better than meh!

Update: The All-Stars showed up. Three fun, competitive placement games (12 minutes apiece) saw Victor Wembanyama & Team World lose two nail biters to the American old heads (Stripes) and young guys (Stars, who Chet Holmgren suited up for).

Credit to Wemby, who clearly raised the competitive floor in word and deed. That was contrasted by the continued disinterest from his world class teammates, Luka and Jokic. Kawhi, LeBron, and Jaylen got the better of Ant and Cade's squad. Holmgren missed all three of his shots in the two-point loss.

Entering the championship game, the Stripes appeared the favorite. Kawhi had just gone Terminator against Team World, scoring 31 points on 13 shots, and the veterans played with a chip on their shoulder to match Kevin Durant's. But in the final, the younger, faster, better Stars outworked and outscored the game's old legends from the jump. Tyrese Maxey (9 pts, 3 stl, 2 rbs, 1 ast) powered the Stars to a 12-1 lead, and Chet's (8 pts, 2 blk, 2 rbs) splash against the wilting Stripes defense closed the door at 39-19 with under two minutes to play. Durant (0 pts) and Kawhi (1 pt) looked tired.

Saturday Night Bolts

To no one's surprise, the All-Star Weekend has been a big ball of meh so far. The DOA Los Angeles crowd has yet to be awoken the league's star players:

• V.J. Edgecomb and Team Vince Carter won the Rising Stars Challenge. (Ajay Mitchell sat out)
• Jared McCain won the celebrity 3-point shootout
• Chet Holmgren played in a confused Shooting Stars Challenge, losing alongside teammates Rip Hamilton, Scottie Barnes, and Druski
• Damian Lillard won his third three-point contest, while remaining out for regular season play
• Carter Bryant choked away the chance to win a lifeless dunk contest over Keshad Johnson

Will Holmgren join Victor Wembanyama to raise the game itself (a confused World vs. USA tournament) to mildly entertaining levels? Mehbe.

(Shai will sit.)

Per Joe Vardon (Athletic), Adam Silver addressed tanking at his All-Star press conference:

Silver, speaking at his annual All-Star Weekend news conference on Saturday, agreed that “tanking,” the decades-old practice of teams losing intentionally to ensure a better draft pick, is worse this season than in years past. He also said policing the league’s teams for tanking — as he did this week by fining the Utah Jazz $500,000 and the Indiana Pacers $100,000 — was not a workable solution to the league’s growing problem of teams being incentivized to lose. “It will lead to very unhealthy relationships between us and our teams,” Silver said.

While saying he's paying "enormous" attention to other league controversies, Silver minimized their urgency: the commissioner deferred to the league's outside firm handling the Clippers' cap circumvention allegations, and said player involvement in gambling markets was currently under control.

Present for All-Star festivities, Shai coached aura farming for schoolkids and waxed on the mentorship he received in Oklahoma City from recently-retired Chris Paul. See the full availability from Shai and Chet below:

Jaylen Brown would love to play SGA in a 1-on-1 All-Star tournament.

Kevin Durant has been in no mood to reminisce over the glories of All-Star games gone by.