David Stern all but officially said last All-Star Game that the city of New York would host the 2015 All-Star Game — the Knicks and Nets were the only teams that had applied to host.
The challenge was getting them to share. The franchises in Brooklyn and Manhattan don’t exactly get along.
That’s still an issue, although commissioner-in-waiting Adam Silver tried to put a positive spin on it talking with the New York Post.
“There is progress in that the teams are working together … recognizing that it’s in both of their interests to create a basketball festival-type atmosphere around All-Star in New York, and so things are going well,” NBA deputy commissioner Adam Silver said this week.
The key stumbling block will be which state-of-the-art arena — the Nets’ new Barclays Center or the Knicks’ refurbished Madison Square Garden — will host the game.”
The Barclay’s Center is brand new and has gotten good reviews, but historic Madison Square Garden has just undergone a nearly $1 billion renovation. One venue will host the Friday and Saturday lead-up events (dunk and three point contests, rookie/sophomore game and so on) and the other will host the All-Star Game itself on Sunday.
The bigger issue may be the Jam Session fan festival, which traditionally his held in a convention space near the arena.
Silver said the NBA still has to figure out where to hold its Jam Session. The venue best suited for it, the Javits Center, is already booked.
“We’ll work around it because we want to find a way for the most people possible to touch our All-Star Weekend, recognizing there is a capped limit on the number of people who can be in the arena,” Silver said. “We’re looking to work our way to build other events and to find a different way, a unique way to build Jam Session in New York.”
It’s going to be fun to have the All-Star Game back in the basketball hotbed of New York City… if they can just work out the details like where to hold the game.
I say we just move the game to The Cage.
