Blog Post #6: “A Brief History of the N.B.A. All-Star Game’s Slide into Competitive Farce”2/26/2018 Stephen Curry (Golden State Warriors) avoids playing defense against Giannis Antetokounmpo (Milwaukee Bucks) during the 2017 N.B.A. All-Star Game. Author: David Gendelman
Date of Publication: February 15, 2018 Category: Sports David Gendelman discusses the history of one of the N.B.A.’s biggest events: the All-Star Game. The All-Star Game is an annual event which gathers the most talented N.B.A. players in the league. The All-Star weekend comprises of various activities and competitions, such as the Dunk Contest or the Celebrity Game, which lead up to the anticipated main event. The once competitive game, initiated by N.B.A. legends, Isiah Thomas and Magic Johnson, has turned into an entertainment-infested event. This year, however, a new game format has been implemented (including higher pay for the winning team and team captains) to encourage the comeback of the competitive nature of the game. Gendelman explains the transition of the structure of the All-Star Game to show the significance of this year’s new game format- one that has been exciting for N.B.A. fans from all over the world. Gendelman uses informal and a mixture of both generic and elegant diction to maintain an informative and casual tone. Gendelman utilizes contractions such as “he’d” and “it’s” throughout the piece, which reflects the casual tone of the piece. The generic diction found in the article, such as using “great” and “putting” also helps create a conversational feel to the article. The elegant diction, such as using “ensuing” or “orchestrate” reflects the informative, more sophisticated tone of the passage. The author evidently feels that the All-Star Game has negatively changed over time in terms of the style of play. He specifically shares his feelings towards this subject by saying that “the best the N.B.A. All-Star Game has to offer nowadays: broad, physical comedy.” He shows further criticism of the modern All-Star Game by saying that it “has completely devolved over the last decade into a revolving door of defenseless alley-oops and dunks.” Like most critics of the All-Star Game, Gendelman expresses the lack of effort and competitiveness of the game. Gendelman appeals to logos and incorporates complex syntax to carry out his message. Gendelman uses information about the new All-Star Game format and many quotes from past, notorious N.B.A. players, such as Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Isaiah Thomas, to appeal to logos. For example, Jabbar states, “I know there’s always griping that players in All-Star Games deliberately don’t play defense, but that wasn’t true for us.” The author chooses to include this account to indicate that even veterans recognize the deterioration of the original All-Star Game format. Compound sentences and the use of commas is the most apparent syntactical technique. For instance, Gendelman states, “Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, who was selected to play in 19 All-Star Games from 1970 to 1989..” He uses the commas to note that Jabbar has been in multiple All-Star Games throughout the years to mirror the credibility and value of this source. The purpose of this article is to explain the change of the structure of the N.B.A. All-Star Game overtime and to suggest the significance of this year’s new format. This is clearly stated in the title: “A Brief History of the N.B.A. All-Star Game’s Slide into Competitive Farce.” Gendelman also specifically reveals his purpose by expressing, “Once the most electric of pro sports’ midseason classics, the All-Star Game has turned more toward entertainment in recent years.” The goal of this piece is to not only inform N.B.A fans about the history of the All-Star Game. but it is to propose ideas on how the new format will either fail or succeed in reviving the original, competitive yet still entertaining game format. Gendelman explains that one of the main reasons older generations of N.B.A. players had the drive to put on a competitive and entertaining game was to facilitate the growth of the league. Since the league no longer needs this help due to their profound amount of success, Gendelman suggests that “The question that remains is not so much if the players can tap into what the game signified in the past. It’s if they can find any meaning for it in the present.” This position is valuable because these questions can be answered by how the players play in this year’s All-Star Game, which includes incentives that may encourage effort from the selected players. Because the game is globally watched (reaching over 200 countries), the success of this year’s new format- depending on whether the players find value in playing a legit game- is incredibly important.
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