Sunday's 2024 NBA All-Star Game will be the pinnacle of this weekend's festivities in Indianapolis, as all the best players gather to celebrate the game of basketball in what promises to be another memorable East vs West encounter. The fans, players and coaches voted in their favorites and although the West has more star power, the young and upcoming stars of th e Eastern Conference certainly won't back down from the challenge.
Tip-off is scheduled for 8 pm ET on TNT, let's dive into some of my best bets for this year's NBA All-Star Game.
Western Conference Money Line (-152)
The West is favored by 2.5 points, I would give them a slight edge in terms of talent here, mainly because the East will be shorthanded on the center position with Joel Embiid missing the game due to injury. Both teams will be hungry to get the win though, the East has a better all-time head-to-head record with 37 wins to 29 of the West. One of the reasons why the format change happened in 2018 was the dominance of the Western Conference which had won 7 of the previous 10 games prior to the change, by an average of 11.1 points.
However, with the last 3 of 4 all-star games being decided by single digits, I'm hoping that is the case with Sunday's game as well. This could be anyone's game really. The West is slightly deeper overall, but the East has the hometown star in Tyrese Haliburton. Experienced players normally take a backseat in these games to the younger ones who are trying to make a name for themselves, however I'm not really sure if a LeBron James or a Kevin Durant will be willing to do that. Who knows how many of these they'll get to be a part of before their careers are over. I'm taking the West win outright.