10 most impactful moments from the 2017-18 NBA season

5. All-Star Game shake-up

The NBA All-Star game saw some unique changes for the first time in a long time — and the changes were excellent.

Instead of the classic East vs. West style, the NBA opted to have each conference’s top vote-getter serve as the two captains (LeBron James and Stephen Curry) and have them draft teams out of the selected All-Stars. This process alone was fascinating and everyone from fans to media wishes the draft would’ve been televised.

It would have been absolutely incredible to see who selected which player and at what point they were selected in the All-Star draft. Maybe that can be something they could change for next year?

For now, the changes the NBA made were spectacular.

I’m about to say something that seems too crazy to even type, but … both All-Star teams actually tried in the All-Star game. I know, I know. Take a moment to let that sink in.

For the first time in many, many years, we had the best players in the world, all on one stage, actually going at each other. It wasn’t just a fast break dunk contest this year. For context, let’s look at the scores from the last three All-Star games.

• 2016: West 196, East 173
• 2017: West 192, East 182
• 2018: Team LeBron 148, Team Stephen 145

I know 148-145 is still a crazy high-scoring game, but it’s not like they’re going to go super hard and risk injury. For an All-Star Game, it was about as good as you can get. It even came down to the final possession where Team Steph failed to convert on a game-tying 3-pointer.

That video is a wonderful example of what it’s like to watch the best players actually play defense and try hard to get buckets. You can tell it meant something to LeBron — just look at his reaction after the game.

The All-Star game was simply wonderful in 2018.